A Debt Repaid
by Grey Imp
Summary: A young man's homeworld is destroyed by Tyranids and he must recover his destiny among the stars. Yes, the title's cheesy, it's a work in progress. 40k. T for language. I'm gonna update pretty frequently for the first ten or so chapters.
1. Chapter 1 Part 1

Chapter 1

**Chapter 1**

"It was also said that Liever Johnson was as kind and caring as he was brave and headstrong; for those who knew him well, knew that he had always been kind and caring, before the terrible day he decided he would avenge her; and it was this love that led him to understand and, yes, even love his enemies.

But in his world, one where men killed mindlessly, killed as though they were created that way, to kill, his love for his enemies would never be a love for his kind."

-Liet Jacobs

Planet Rynadon

6.08.40185

Under the hot sun of Rynadon lay a small glade, surrounded by a quiet and peaceful jungle. Soft grass moved lightly in the breeze blowing from a distant sea. In the trees chattered native squirrels, and a few birds flitted in the afternoon rays. A small leather satchel lay on the ground, its contents spilled on the whispering forest of grass. Several shaded pencils littered the ground, as well as the remains of a purple guavanna fruit, a plant native to the jungle world of Rynadon. A sketchpad and one of the pencils were held delicately in the soft touch of a young boy.

Liever Johnson slowly traced the outline of an upright, curious squirrel. His hands barely seemed to move as he drew the animal on the rough paper. He squinted and tilted the paper slightly. A miniscule touch of his hand added a gleam to the gray squirrel that would never move. He shifted his weight slightly. A twig snapped.

The small animal twitched and looked up. It doubled back as if to run, quavered for a moment, and then scampered of into the thick jungle undergrowth.

Liever shaded his eyes and looked through the thick underbrush. He stared off, trying to catch one last glimpse of the small rodent, but it was gone.

He leaned back and gazed off into the horizon. On Rynadon, the hours were short, text and he could already see the sun beginning to descend into the horizon. It would be dark in an hour or two.

Suddenly, Liever squinted into the bright sun. He might have been imagining it, but he thought he saw something falling to the ground a few miles away, falling from space. To him, the only thing they reminded him of were gigantic specks of pollen…spores…

He sighed. He must have been imagining it. He slowly picked himself up.

The young boy was about 15 years old, and lean but muscular. His short wave of brown bangs accented his hazelnut eyes that gazed with a strange intensity. His face was long and slightly angular. He carried a small tattoo of the Khalanian Trinity – the sign of the native religion, the Khala, on Rynadon – on his neck, three bright stars encircled with a serpent's tail. The name Alicia and a small heart were written below it in neat blue letters.

"Leaf!" came a voice from the side of the clearing.

Liever turned and watched as a beautiful girl emerged from the trees to his right. Her long black hair was thrown over her face in a mess, and as he watched, she flicked it impatiently over her shoulder, and then gave Liever a stunning smile.

"Why d'you always have to stare at me like that, Leaf?" she said playfully. "It makes me think you're plotting something devious."

Liever – alias Leaf – grinned and said in a moderately low voice, "Definitely, Alicia. I'm planning a conspiracy with the butterflies to get you. Where've you been, anyway? Wrestling snakes again?"

She flashed him another brilliant smile, this time accompanied by a light giggle. "I told you, that was an accident. I swear some of these wild animals are out to get me."

"Do I count?" he said, attempting to pull off a straight face and failing miserably.

Her laughter filled her eyes, ringing crystal clear and bright through the hot, lush forest.

Liever walked to the edge of the clearing toward a cleverly concealed car, hidden in the trees. It was a small, open vehicle, room enough for two or three, with a large bed in the back. They tossed their things in the car, and then jumped over the sides – there were no real doors.

Alicia sidled into the front seat and turned on the car, while Liever literally hopped into the seat next to her. For reasons he could not quite fathom, Alicia had always insisted on driving. He suspected it had something to do with the way he tended to jump out of his seat when she drove – she had always been a thrill seeker, where he tended to worry if they went more than 40 kilometers per hour.

Liever glanced at the speedometer as they set off. It was broken.

The small vehicle bounded across a narrow road, bumping erratically. Ferns lined the side of the road, as abundant as weeds on the jungle planet. Small animals leapt into the underbrush as the car sped by. A high cloud of dust obscured the back window in a magnificent rising plume. A few loose items in the bed of the car rattled.

Leaf sat in the passenger seat and slowly snaked his arm around the slim form of Alicia. She was focused solely on the road in front of her, navigating the hairpin turns at breathtaking speed. She cut through a fern hanging low over the road, and then spun the wheel tightly to compensate for a hairpin bend. The back wheels lost traction, and for one grim second Liever felt as if they were going to spill over. But then they caught, and the car swept up a large hill.

Liever had a sudden sick feeling in his stomach. This was the worst part, always right here. Alicia always insisted on taking this most dangerous path, and it had always ended up going right here. He squeezed Alicia's shoulder tightly as they zoomed forward and crested the hill at an incredible speed.

Liever gasped. He couldn't help himself, even though he had been here a thousand times and had been expecting it. The car was rising.

Twisting backwards, he saw what he already new from a thousand such trips. The hill was not really a hill at all, but a small cliff. Its face was nearly vertical, pitted and scarred by ancient volcanic action. Tops of trees on the cliff were almost at eye level, and the ones below him were at least thirty feet below. Birds were shrieking in alarm from their nests in the trees below at this giant, noisy invasion of their privacy.

Liever felt a jolt and the car began to drop sickeningly. He began to turn back around and brace himself. This would be the worst part, the impact. He couldn't stand this, not now not ever.

But as he felt himself begin to rise in his seat, a flash of light lit the corner of his vision. A small part of the horizon had lit up with a nearly blinding white light. Instinctively curious, despite the imminent crash, he began to turn back.

And then the car hit the ground.

Not prepared, he slammed into the ground, Liever momentarily blacked out. His head sagged on the headrest and his arms fell limp to his sides. Then he woke up and started. He looked around at Alicia, who had clearly not noticed anything.

"Stop!" he tried to yell over the roar of the engine.

Alicia glanced sideways, but did not relax her foot. She just looked inquisitive.

"STOP!" he screamed wildly again, gesticulating forcefully.

Alicia got the message this time. She nodded and slammed her foot down on the brake and they swerved wildly to a stop.

"What-" she began, but Liever had already jumped out of the car and was scanning the horizon. He could not see anything at first, but then a golden contrail flared to life in the sky. It streaked across the orange and red tinges of the mid-afternoon rays, contrasting fiercely against the soft evening colors. It sailed closer and closer to the ground, and then landed with a huge explosion only a few miles from where they stood. The sky lit up with a magnificent orange and white glow, then faded back to normal.

As flames licked the sky, the tops of trees seemed to bend over, as if a high wind were coming. But Liever knew that no wind was that powerful. Something much worse was coming.

He shouted out a warning. "Behind the car! Now!"

Alicia did not hesitate to obey. She leapt right over the bed of the car, followed closely by Liever, who scrambled over the seats. They both leaped down and huddled in each other's embraces.

Nothing happened for about thirty seconds. Liever picked his head up just a little. Maybe, he thought, just maybe-

And then the shockwave hit.

Time seemed frozen for Liever. He could see plants ripped up by the roots and flung as if at hyper speed; he saw the ground swelling and cracking here and there; he could see Alicia's hair whipping around his chest, her face buried in his jacket; and he could see the car, tossed inches over his head off the road. It looked dangerously close to him.

Then something clipped his temple, and all went warmly and pleasantly black.

Liever woke up with Alicia bending over him, peering anxiously into his face. Her face was peppered with small cuts, and her hair was disheveled. Her nose seemed to be bleeding slightly, but otherwise looked none the worse for the wear. He blinked, and she smiled with obvious relief.

"You have very pretty eyes, you know," he said.

She smiled ever more broadly.

He tried to smile too, but it turned into a grimace at the pain in his mouth. He tasted blood, and spat. Two white teeth came out onto the ground along with a nasty-looking mixture of blood and saliva. Liever groaned.

"What happened?" he managed to stammer out.

"The car flipped over us," said Alicia. "Just flipped right over our heads. I think the tailpipe must have hit you on the forehead. And a huge branch swept into us. It hit your body, but the smaller twigs and leaves only hit me. You were already unconscious, and I hit a tree and lost it for a few seconds too. When I woke up it was already over, and I found you at the foot of this tree." She gestured to the tall rowan he was lying underneath. "I considered dragging you up into the car, but you seemed to hurt to move."

"I don't feel that bad," began Liever as he tried to push himself up. Enormous pain shot through his ribs, and he gasped at the intensity. He put a hand on his chest and gingerly eased himself back down. "That hurt," he said, once he was lying back down.

Alicia leaned over him, concern on her face. She bit her lip.

"Damn," she said. "I think you've probably broken a few ribs. That's pretty nasty looking." She went back to the car and began rummaging around for something.

Liever groaned and lay back again. A bird glided down to the branch above his head and cocked its head inquisitively. He glared at it until it lost interest and flew off, twittering madly.

Liever stared up at the sky and watched dark clouds move across the purple-red sky. Liever thought about the strange object. He had not seen anything unusual in the afternoon. He had remembered looking across the golden sky –

Liever frowned suddenly. He looked more closely at the sky. Red and purple. But that must mean –

"Alicia!" he yelled.

She looked up questioningly, clutching a bottle of painkiller spray. He motioned her over, and she hastened to the tree.

"How long have I been out?" he asked, dread beginning to curl in his stomach.

Alicia looked surprised, then stared off into the distance. She seemed to be thinking hard.

At last she turned back to him. "I'd say… maybe four or five hours?"

Liever yelped and almost tried to get up, but his chest twinged painfully.

Panting heavily, he turned to Alicia, who had a concerned and fearful look on her face.

"You need to get back to the village, quickly." He said heavily. "I'll be fine here for a little bit. No, just go," he said, as she opened her mouth to protest in shock. "That shock wave will have hit them… you're one of the most skilled medical personnel we have. There could be dozens of deaths if you don't go and assist," he added grimly.

Her mouth tightened. "I can't just leave you here! What if something else happens? There's no way you could stay safe here."

Liever thought hard. On one hand, they needed to get back to the village immediately. On the other, he knew he could not hope to survive in this wilderness on his own. His eyes fell on the bike hooked onto the car where the spare tire would normally be. His mind reached the obvious conclusion.

"Ok," he said. "You take the bike. Get some medical supplies while I stay here with the car. We've got a rifle or something in there, haven't we?"

She nodded tersely.

"Good," he said. "Drive the car over here, and I'll spend the night in the car."

She nodded again and walked over to the car, got in. She turned the key in the ignition, and the car roared to life. She drove it around to the tree he was slumped against. She reached into the trunk and pulled out a rifle. She handed it to him. He took it and put it beside him.

"OK," he said. "Take the bike and go."

She unhooked the small electric bike and swung a leg over it, then turned to face him. "Stay safe, alright?"

He managed a small smile. "I will."

She smiled in return, then turned away. She twisted the throttle and raced off, following the road into the swiftly darkening night. In a few moments she was gone from Liever's sight.

He sighed and closed his eyes. He found the rifle with his hand and held it while he drifted off to an uneasy sleep.

About ten yards from where Liever slept, unbeknownst to him, a small group of strange creatures stole across another clearing. Lizard-like forms ran swiftly and lightly across the grass.

One creature halted and lifted its angular head. A row of teeth was exposed, and a single beady eye glinted in the moonlight. It sniffed the air and cocked its head. Its fellows stopped too, heads cocked. All was still and silent.

A few yards away, Liever's hand, in his sleep, involuntarily gripped the rifle harder.

All of a sudden, the creatures, as one, scampered away in the same direction as before, leaving nothing but a quickly fading footstep in the grass.


	2. Chapter 1 Part 2

Imperial Starship Sirrah's Pride

Imperial Starship _Sirrah's Pride_

In Hyperspace Quadrant 2487b (Rynadon System)

6.07.40185

Private Jacobs, of Unit 11 in the fifty-seventh regiment under commander Perrell, was lying on his bunk in the crowded barracks of his unit. He was doing something that the general bulk of the Imperial Guard foot soldiers wouldn't be caught dead doing. He was reading a book. It was a very special book to him. It had been found among a ruin at Terra, his home planet. It was titled _The Wisdom of War_, and it had no author. The book began with a single quote, which Jacobs loved. At the moment, he was reading it, a single sentence on an otherwise blank page, with a slight smile on his face:

"A Soldier will fight long and hard for a bit of colored ribbon" – Napoleon Bonaparte

All of a sudden, his contemplations were most rudely and unexpectedly jarred, as the Private himself would have said.

Captain Martin stomped into the main barracks, looking, from Private Jacob's point, furious. Of course, that in and of itself wasn't such a big surprise. The Captain, it was said, always seemed to be perpetually angry. Most people divined the Captain's mood by his hands. Open, he was fine or slightly annoyed. Balled into fists, and he was really angry. But if he was holding a gun in his hands, he was always very, very happy. This was his disposition as he walked into the barracks of Unit 11.

What was remarkably surprising about his entrance was this fact – that he was holding a really big gun. No officers were allowed to carry anything larger than a small solid-shot pistol with them on the ship under most conditions, and most officers chose not to – it made them look weak to their subordinates. The only time anyone was allowed to carry around a larger combat weapon – which was informally defined as "anything bigger than a goddamn remote" – was if the landing zone for a drop was fourteen hours or less away. This was a submission to the fact that a whole ship full of soldiers took a long time to get themselves together in less than that much time – the reasoning was simply that there were too many damn soldiers, even for the military speed and precision that dominated among the ranks of the Imperial Guard. So it also wasn't strange that they didn't know that they would be expected to drop soon. What _was_ strange was what _they_ had expected.

About a year and a half ago, the ship _Sirrah's Pride_ had received a set of battle orders. A large brood of Tyranids had, very quickly, wiped out almost half a dozen worlds in a system full of habitable planets. It had occurred extremely quickly – only a decade or so – but after the first Tyranid invasion, the Imperium had become alert for this sort of thing and decided that quick and decisive action was imperative. _Sirrah's Pride_ was dispatched three months later. It was estimated it would take a little over two years to reach their destination.

Private Jacobs was particularly uneasy. Their mission was top priority, and they wouldn't have stopped except for an extreme emergency. Possibly, he thought their own ship was about to be attacked. As a foot soldier, there wasn't really anything he could do in a space battle, and in the army, not being able to protect yourself meant almost certain fatality.

The Captain, however, seemed to find himself beyond such mundane concerns. His voice barged into Jacob's train of thought, sending all but his most fundamental thoughts fleeing. "Get set, boys and girls, the LZ is hot, the sparks flying and aliens dying! Get ter Equip, then get the hell to DZ! Three hours! Move it!" Jacobs rolled his eyes. These military cavalier officers all had the same style: all gung-ho, exactly the sort of 'I don't know but I've been told' men. As they said, there were exactly three rules to being an officer: Treat your men like girls or babies and swear at them a lot. The officers also did not tend to excel in the area of refined education.

Jacobs dropped from his bunk. He understood Captain Martin's little speech, as well as what he was supposed to do. LZ stood for Landing Zone; that was where the Imperial Guard would land. Since they couldn't be anywhere near the system they started out for, no one really knew where that was; or if they did, they weren't telling. By comparison, DZ was Drop Zone, the gigantic bay where the army would leave the ship for whatever planet they were landing on. And Equip was slang for Equipment Management, a part of the ship where the army would go to pick up their guns and, In Jacobs' case, armor. He was lucky – his veteran squad was one of the few who got the slightly more protective armor, rather than the standard flak jacket. He would head to Equip, and then take a quick detour to the observation platform – also known as the op room, because of the number of officials who tended to be there. Then he would head to the DZ. With the right timing, he would get there just in time.

Jacobs opened the door, walked in a few meters, and stopped, his mouth open.

In front of him was a gigantic planet. It was huge even for most planets. He had never seen one so big in all of space. And it was rotating extremely quickly, to his eyes. Daylight must only last about seven or eight hours on this planet, he thought. A dense mat of clouds obscured a large corner of the planet, but where the clouds were wispier, he saw that this was very much a water planet. A vast blue ocean predominated. There were enormous ice caps, the tendrils of which easily reached halfway to the equator. A comparatively small continent sat on the eastern edge of what Jacobs could see, but he was not fooled; because of the planet's vast size, this continent could be the size of continents on planets with mainly land. However, this was not what shocked him.

He saw spores. Hundreds of them - thousands, possibly. This gigantic planet, he realized with a sinking feeling, was the site of a Tyranid invasion.

He raced down to Drop. The story of this planet, he knew, would not have a happy ending.

Planet Rynadon

6.08.40185

The bike bounced and rattled along the rutted road. Alicia gritted her teeth to stop them breaking like brittle glass and twisted the throttle more. It was dangerous, but she knew speed was of the essence. It was almost an hour since she had left Liever, and she knew she was close. She just had to make it across a small canyon. The canyon was just through the foliage ahead. A narrow rope bridge, just wide enough for a car, and then on to the village, and she could alert everyone to Liever's trouble. Although they probably had problems of their own.

_Just a little farther,_ she thought. _Just through these ferns-_

Alicia burst through the ferns in question, the bike fishtailing slightly. The canyon was, as predicted right ahead. And the bridge –

Alicia swore suddenly and twisted the handlebars, the bike spinning out of control. She swore again and twisted the brake. The bike began to skid sideways toward the canyon's edge. A plume of mud shot up, obscuring her view. She was half on, half off, unable to do anything but close her eyes tight.

The bike stopped.

Alicia opened her eyes slowly. She looked around, then pulled her leg from under the bike, holding onto the handlebars with one hand. She peered over the edge. One wheel was spinning slowly over the air.

Alicia gazed out over the canyon, and a huge knot of anxiety in the pit of her stomach exploded.

There was no bridge.

Actually, to be precise, there really was a bridge. It was broken, though. The two halves were hanging down on either side. The ends of each bridge where it had been broken apart were slightly smoldering, as if something extremely hot had sliced through them. A small trickle of smoke lazily wound up into the sky, crossing the moon, winding up into space.

As Alicia stared out over the canyon, a crazy idea entered her head. She had to get across the canyon. The bridge was broken. There was no other way to cross.

When she was a few years younger – about seventeen or so – she had gotten the idea of crossing this canyon. There had been no bridge back then, and so she had gotten Liever and a couple of other friends to help her build it. Her village on Rynadon was quite small; it was just a colony, relatively new, only a few decades old. It was mainly a big village of farmers and the two innkeepers. No one had any special professions, so no one knew how they might build a bridge. And until then, there was nobody worth crossing the canyon to get to – in fact, there was no one at all to get to. So she had to build the bridge by herself.

About a year later, she had the notion of crossing _without _the bridge. So she had built a ramp, run trials, and used a long rope attached to a makeshift safety harness as her only precaution against danger. The rope was connected to the bridge.

She remembered the event well; she had gone about 10 yards from the lip of the canyon, revved up, and shot off the ramp. She was about halfway across, when the bike flew from under her and landed on the other side of the canyon. She didn't quite make it; she sometimes said that her bruises _still_ hurt. But she had still recognized it as the only other way to get across the canyon.

So she knew that she would have to jump.

She walked over to a mound of earth she had constructed a few years ago. It was a makeshift ramp, and last time it had served her well. But would it be sturdy enough after all these years? She didn't have time to test it now, to run trials. And she definitely couldn't make a harness, even if she had had time. No bridge, you see.

But she still had to get across, and this was the only way.

Determined not to look over the edge, Alicia wheeled the bike to the very edge of the small clearing she was in, then turned the bike around. She hesitated for a second, then swung her leg over the seat and settled in. Butterflies beat a tattoo against the inside of her stomach. She swallowed, and then turned on the engine.

She revved the motor. Several birds flitted away suddenly, indignant as the bike roared. Alicia watched them go with little interest, then turned her set gaze to the canyon in front of her.

_Ok, Alicia,_ she thought. _Stop stalling. Get on with it._

Then she heard a different voice. _This is insane,_ it said. Liever.

She grinned. First sign of madness, voices in her head. _This is for you, Liever,_ she thought.

Nothing happened for several seconds, then a minute. The motor rumbled passively. The birds alighted on a farther tree, cocking their heads, inquisitively inspecting the bike. Then –

Alicia suddenly twisted the throttle as far as it would go. The bike shot up a huge plume of dirt, then suddenly found traction and kicked forward. Alicia was almost thrown off, but held on. Her head snapped back, and she winced. Through the pain, she pulled her head forward and twisted the handlebars slightly. The bike turned a little and was now heading straight for the ramp. She squeezed her eyes almost shut.

The bike flew off the ramp. The motor ran frantically, spinning the wheels in space. As the bike climbed higher, Alicia twisted the handlebars and pulled one end up.

The effect was immediate. The bike was pulled around, so that it began to spin slowly in mid-air. At the same time, it flipped sideways, over her head. Her hands were jerked away and she began to freefall.

Alicia twisted her body convolutedly, and she began to spin around, fast. She used her arms to protect her head and tucked her legs in, now spinning even faster. She braced herself for impact and squeezed her eyes tightly.

A second passed, maybe two. Then her knee slammed into the ground. Her sense of gravity reoriented and her arms flew out over her head. She sprawled into the ground as pain shot through her knee. She lay there for a second.

Suddenly she twisted to the left, rolling sideways, as the bike crashed down where her leg had been seconds ago. It bounced on the rutted path and then slid sideways, coming to a halt at the base of a small tree.

Alicia lay, clutching her knee, her face taught with pain. The birds were everywhere, flying in the air, twittering exasperatedly. The racket they were making drilled through her head, adding to the massive headache she already had.

She groaned, and then squeezed her knee. She gasped with the intense pain as the bone popped back into place. Then the pain was gone, and a sigh of relief swept through her. She ran a hand through her hair as she pushed herself up into a sitting position. She put her hands back on the ground and tilted backwards, grinning fiercely at the sky.

_Take that, Liever, _she thought.


	3. Chapter 1 Part 3

Imperial Starship Sirrah's Pride

Imperial Starship _Sirrah's Pride_

In High Orbit over Planet Rynadon

6.08.40185

Far above the steamy jungles of Rynadon, a gigantic behemoth of a starship hung above the atmosphere, a peaceful giant. Just waiting to be disturbed.

In the deep bowels of the spaceship, a distant mechanical clanking was heard. Faint shouts of many hundreds – or thousands – of men echoed down the many lonely, deserted corridors that crisscrossed the titanic spaceship.

Silence. And then a faint hissing –

Louder –

And louder –

To a crescendo of steam, resounding through the pipes in the walls, rushing onward to its destination.

And then slowly, ever so slowly, the docking clamps released. And just as slowly, the gigantic drop pod fell free from the even larger ship –

Falling down, and down –

And down –

Into silence.

It was the deep silence of space!

The silent behemoth sped down towards the surface of the planet at hundreds of thousands of kilometers per hour. It raced down toward the hard unforgiving ground, like a bird who has lost the will to live, no more to anyone on the planet than a merry, twinkling, shooting star.

And still it hurtled downwards, onwards.

The huge metal machine entered the atmosphere. It was accented by a very soft, red glow. But the glow grew, until it was a giant conflagration, not only red now, but orange, and yellow, even white. It was almost pretty against the star-speckled velvet of space. A buffer of wind was pushed towards the surface of the planet.

As it rushed downwards.

A switch closed somewhere in the ship and several panels slid back. Large, cumbersome booster engines slid out on mechanical titanium arms. A hum of electricity could have been heard, had anyone been there to hear it. The fuel canisters clattered into their slots.

The booster engines fired.

And still the ship fell.

Gradually, fuel canisters emptied. They were unclamped and released. Some fell in tandem with the ship, others dropped down. They soon shriveled up into black, twisted cylinders.

More engines pulled out and fired. Drag fins opened on the ship, were instantly lit ablaze. Ever so slowly, the ship pulled its nose up. It began to shoot towards the ground with a slightly more tilted angle. Yet more engines fired, more flaps pulled away from the ship. Debris began to pull loose. Several fins and flaps broke off and peeled away, rising behind the ship like a child's pickup sticks thrown casually into the air.

And then the ship burst through the clouds, and with a resounding explosion, slammed into the ground.

Planet Rynadon

7.09.40185

Liever woke slightly late in the morning, and cried out softly in pain. His ribs were aching. He felt as if someone had removed, slow-roasted over an open flame, and then re-inserted them. It was such… _painful_ pain. He gritted his teeth and balled his left fist. His right still held the shotgun.

Letting go of the shotgun, Liever reached into his pocket and pulled out two sleeping pills. He reached into his other pocket and found a little flask of water. He popped the pills in his mouth and then took a swig, gulping them down. Then he rearranged his bed of leaves and curled up to rest.

In seconds he was asleep.

Planet Rynadon

7.09.40185

Alicia's bike raced into the town, following old dirt roads that had lasted for generations. The town seemed to have taken the tremor relatively well. The buildings seemed stable, although there was obvious evidence of the quake all around: smashed jars, roof shingles littering the ground, a single door shaken loose from its hinges.

The town seemed deserted; in the cold air of the few hours before dawn, nothing stirred. Dust swirled between empty corridors and through vacated windows. As Alicia raced by on her motorcycle, an open door creaked on its hinges, swung slightly. Behind it a subtle shadow flitted, and a pair of cold, inhuman eyes gleamed in the darkness of the empty home, followed her retreating back.

The bike swerved around a corner, following one of the largest of the streets. On any given day this street would have been full of life, bustling as the tiny community went about its business. But now, not even the ghosts of those people remained to Alicia.

A light breeze lifted suddenly, pushed at Alicia's back. It built slowly in intensity to a whistling wind, lifting the hairs on the back of her neck. It seemed the wind was pushing her toward her destination, and she rounded a corner into the town square at a racing speed.

The sight that met her eyes was that of the worst death and destruction imaginable.

The town had not been deserted. It had not been evacuated. It had been _exterminated._

The square was full of bodies. They were aligned in neat rows, with a horrifying and disgusting precision and neatness that was in many ways more gruesome than the holo vids of the noble Space Marines killed by Chaos Space Marines and left to rot in huge piles of dead. Here, it was as if every man, woman and child had been herded into the square, and then killed, methodically, one by one, with an alien precision that was terrifying to see.

Alicia's face went slack. She moaned and put an arm across her face, squeezing her eyes shut, and stumbled off the bike. She staggered away a few steps, and then stumbled to her knees. Bending double, she heaved onto the dusty cobblestone of the town square. She threw up twice, three times, taking shuddering gasps, her eyes averted from the neat lines of death.

Presently, she got to her feet. Her black coat lay on the ground, dusty and a little muddy. She threw it over her head, like a mourning shawl, whispering a quick, shaky prayer.

She began to walk through the lines of bodies. Every familiar face leapt out at her, most of the dead faces drawing strangled gasps of recognition. She continued this way, forcing herself to look in the eyes of every dead man, woman, and child, to tell herself that they had not found peace but were in a better place. Finally she came to the two bodies she had been looking for: her mother and father.

Alicia fell to her knees. Hands shuddering, she pulled the coat over her head and laid it over their faces. She clasped her hands and whispered the same prayer. Head bent, she bowed among the dead, kissing her parents' foreheads.

Suddenly, she threw her head back and let out a wail. It was an agonizing sound, almost inhuman in the grief and anguish that spilled out through her voice, choked to silence by sobs.

And suddenly the square was full of chattering noises; dust lifted as Alicia whirled around, found herself pushed to the ground, a sudden pain across her arm and blood splashing on her chest; she staggered up, and turned around, glimpsing only black scaly skin before she was thrown to the ground again, and then a terrible searing pain was in her chest, and –

When the dust cleared, another body had been added to the death lines of the people of Rynadon.


	4. Chapter 2 Part 1

Chapter 2

**Chapter 2**

"Don't bother asking him if he feels any allegiance to the Emperor or anyone else; he'll just laugh."

_-Liet Jacobs_

Planet Rynadon, Temporary Base Camp of the 57th Regiment

7.09.40185

Captain Martin stormed around the landing zone, scowling in what was unmistakably one of his worst moods.

Near the titanic, smoldering hunk of metal that was the now-unusable drop pod, a small tent had been erected. The tent was red and green, standard command colors for Commander Perrell of the fifty-seventh regiment. A few techs in fatigues were hauling equipment in and out of a large flap in the tent, installing wires and calling tech jargon to each other.

"Roberts! Don't fuck with that output line! We need to – oh, shit!"

"Jones? You moron! If I told you once I told you a thousand – NO, GROUND IT! You're gonna get fried!

"Hey man, I'm working on it! Roberts is being – ROBERTS! Get your fucking hands offa that!

"Eh, I love you too, sweetheart. I need the line for the holo projector, the carrier signal is going haywire – "

"You two! Shut up! Captain!"

The techs looked around. One of them swore, then they straightened and saluted. Martin growled and touched his head. The Techs bent over again, doing whatever they had already been doing. Martin had always hated technical things. In fact, he reflected, he hated almost everything. Moody Marty, they'd called him in school. He hated them. He showed them up, too, and that's when he landed up in the military. Turned out to be one of the things he hated the most. Along with fruitcake. Martin hated fruitcake.

Ducking under the tent flap, he couldn't hide his anxiety, even between one of his best scowls. Clutching a slip of paper in his hand – an official invitation from commander Perrell himself – he advanced to the makeshift desk, removed his helmet, tucked it under his arm and saluted smartly.

Commander Perrell was writing an order. It was obviously an order, Martin saw, had the military seal and everything. All it needed was a signature and the commander's personal seal, and it would be good to go.

Commander Perrell signed with a flourish, carefully printing his name below his signature. It was then that he glanced up at Martin. His hawkish eyes darted quickly over Martin, taking in his appearance – his crisp military front, his sharp perfunctory salute. The corner of his mouth twitched. He touched his temple with two fingers, then looked down again, bending down and taking something out of a vest pocket. He rummaged with something near the floor – Martin could not see what – but he heard a draw shut and a latch snap closed. Perrell straightened, holding his personal seal and tucking a small golden key into his vest pocket. He pressed the seal into a jar of hot wax, then pressed it on the paper, below his signature, still in silence. Having done that, he rested his elbows on the table and leaned forward.

"Captain Martin. How good to see you." He glance down at the paper in front of him. "I seem to have an order here for you."

"Yes, sir," was Martin's only response.

"Privates! Form up!"

The Privates dutifully lined up to the measured, metallic voice of the mechanical Drill Sergeant. The Drill Sergeant was a curious thing, a holographic projection on a multi-legged tripod. The thing was a simulation of an old and weathered general, cap on head, wearing light armor and affecting many medals and honours. It represented another step in the ongoing quest for superiors to have as little as communication with their inferiors as possible. From the captain's point of view, it was a marvel of engineering. The privates, needless to say, hated it, almost as much as they hated taking orders from their captain – which was one of the few reasons they preferred it.

"Privates! Level, aim, and fire!"

The sound of lasbursts echoed across the division, the multitude of shots that seemed so loud in the privates' ears only registering as faint, echoing pops in the ears of Captain Martin, who was sitting in his tent, at his desk. He had waited until the privates had started training to sneak away to the relative quiet and unobtrusiveness of his personal tent.

Martin reached into his pocket, pulling out the order and laying it on his desk. He then bent down, removed a small knife from a virtually undetectable pocket in the fabric of his leg, and slit the envelope open. He put his knife back in its cloth scabbard, then unfolded the order and smoothed it out to read:

_"Order 177985, reference Mark II _(it read)_: Captain Martin and his squad of Elite Veterans will proceed to the artifact at map, reference point (217.8,3587). The squad will then plant a target charge on artifact and evacuate all civilians and personnel to map, reference point (283.4, 1243). Signed,--"_

Martin paused. These were very odd instructions indeed. And although most thought of Martin as a little daft, it was only part of his image. He could be an analytical thinker at times. And his analysis was going into overdrive. There were a lot of strange things going on here.

First, the name of the order. An order with the tag 'reference Mark II' was an order from a very high place indeed. The only people who got orders with higher priority than this were the Emperor's personal servants – his personal guard, etc. A Mark II order came from someone with one of the most powerful positions in the galaxy – possibly from the Emperor himself. By comparison, Martin's entire regiment was on ship headed for a battle that everyone knew probably ended years ago only because of a Mark VIII order.

Secondly, the order itself didn't make much sense to Martin. He hadn't heard about any artifact – the Navigators had simply said that they were warping out of hyperspace near a planet called Rynadon, because of orders from some higher-ups. No one even seemed exactly clear why they had landed on the planet at all – except Commander Perrell, and now, it seemed, Captain Martin. All for some dumb "artifact".

A dumb artifact, Martin reminded himself, which merited a Mark II order.

The third was the order to place a target charge. A target charge was a small device that, when placed and activated, created a homing beacon which would call down an orbital strike. But it made no sense to use a target charge on this world; they were only used in places where scans were useless, mainly because of stealth shields. But it made no sense to use them here; the crews aboard the ship could detect anything larger than a squirrel, and if it was smaller than that, they wouldn't need an orbital strike to destroy it.

Martin shrugged, folding the order up and putting it in his pocket. Orders were orders.

He pulled out the letter from inside his vest. It was tightly furled, and as he unrolled it he leaned back in his chair to read it:

_"The target charge is not for an orbital strike. Something much worse is going to happen, and it would be wise to complete your mission and get off the planet._

_If you meet a young man on this world, stay away from him at all costs. He is considered by the Emperor to be the most dangerous man in the galaxy, the sole survivor of an ancient race. He is the only one who has lived on this planet his whole life, and that still lives."_

Puzzled, Martin turned the letter over in his hands, thinking hard. Finally, he shrugged again, rolled the letter up, put it in his vest, and left the tent to prepare his squad.

Planet Rynadon

7.09.40185

Liever awoke and groaned for the third time in twenty-four hours. His ribs were aching and he still had a pounding headache. He couldn't understand what had woken him – the birds were quiet, and there were no animals scurrying through the undergrowth.

Liever frowned. _There were no birds._ He shaded his forehead with a hand and glanced up. Greenish yellow sunlight filtered down the many layers of the tree leaves, and Liever knew from the position of the light that it was about midday. But at that time, the forest should be loud and noisy, not quiet.

Deadly quiet.

Liever had only seen something like this once before. It always signaled the approach of something very, very dangerous. He knew something was coming, and panic constricted in his throat.

It was then, when he was frozen, unable to move in the deadly quiet forest, that he sensed it. It wasn't something that he heard, or even felt. It was just something else, dancing around the fringe of his mind, like bees around a flower. Liever seemed to suddenly understand that another consciousness was on the verge of discovering his own. Tentatively, Liever concentrated on it, and was suddenly aware of his mind and thoughts expanding to fill the vast space that he now perceived.

And then the two minds touched.

Liever found his brain full of an overwhelming flow of sudden consciousness, thoughts and memories filling his mind and expanding it, threatening to exceed the limit of his skull. He had memories going back thousands of years, sudden visions of terrifying, blood red aliens with vicious teeth and claws, consuming everything in their path, laying triumphant, cold, calculating waste to endless worlds. He saw with endless eyes, searching eyes that focused everywhere and saw everything. He saw a man, old and withered, but with a mind equaled by none. He saw an ancient artifact, seething with power yet to be uncovered.

And he saw himself.

He saw himself with clarity and surprise as the mind studied him, studied this young human that contained so powerful a mind. It studied him, and came to the conclusion that his mind was one it would be worth adding to the compounded minds that formed the single consciousness Liever felt.

And as it took hold of him, Liever finally understood it for what it truly was.

The Tyranid Hive Mind.

Planet Rynadon

7.09.40185

Private Jacobs pushed aside a tall fern and emerged from the hot jungle into an open grassy plateau sitting atop a cliff. It was a sheer face, a sudden drop that lead to a deadly fall down to the vast jungle below. The shimmering horizon, receding thousands, perhaps tens of thousands of kilometers away, awed him.

He leaned over the cliff, whistled, and spat. He unshouldered his pack and turned to watch the rest of his squad emerge from the foliage.

Martin came through first, yielding a very dangerous looking machete, and looking as though he would have liked to use it on something other than a couple of ferns. He stormed off into the bushes on the opposite side of the clearing, muttering something about taking a shit. Following closely was Edward, the most gung-ho private in the squad, who pronounced his name with a flourish of the Germans of Old Earth, Ed-vard. He was gripping his gun tightly and using his other hand to par the vegetation. A few paces behind him was Keller, the oldest of the veterans, with a face that had been twisted with so many battle scars that it look as if he carried a painful grimace, complimenting his morose disposition. Next to him was Gerald, a private almost as old as Keller, with an honest-looking face but a sly and cunning mind. A few meters behind, Corporal Checker, easily the largest man in the squad, with an exuberant smile and a really big flamethrower, was strolling through the jungle, conversing loudly with Webber, a small and quick man with a curious affinity for explosives. Last came Einhardt, swearing and spitting. Einhardt carried a long sniper rifle, a high-tech piece of equipment, which fired armor piercing, crystallized steel bullets at supersonic speeds, capable of puncturing the fiercest and thickest armor. He was also hauling a case that contained the target charge.

The squad flopped down on the grass, slinging bags off their shoulders, dropping to the ground and giving their legs a well-needed respite. Einhardt dropped his equipment, pulled out a little flask, took a swig, swished it in his mouth, and spat it out in a gleaming arc. The stream narrowly missed Checker, who ducked to avoid it.

"Hey, man, watch where you're spittin'!" he growled, moving away from the wet spot on grass.

Einhardt spat again in the grass, and then carefully sat on the ground. He stretched his legs and leaned back. "It's the bugs! The damn bugs!"

"What are you griping about now?" said Webber in an annoyed voice. "Pass me the charge."

"Sure thing," said Einhardt, lifting the black case and passing it to Webber, who leaned over onto his toes to reach for it. "What I was _griping_ about are the gnats in this place. There was a whole friggin' cloud of 'em, got in my eyes and mouth." There was some general chuckling. He spat again.

"Look at this," said Webber. He had opened the jet-black case and removed a device about the size of a stick of dynamite. He held it up to the light. "Anyone back at camp a psychic?"

"Yeah, I think we got a couple," said Checker. "Why?"

Webber gave a low whistle. "This is a target charge. Haven't you ever seen one before?"

Most of the veterans shook their heads, but Keller tipped his head in affirmation, and Gerald leaned forward, curious. "No, I've never seen one, but I've heard about them. Why? I thought they were standard light-wave pattern."

Webber shook his head. "Not this one. See this symbol right here?" He tapped the plastic casing. "That's a psychic symbol. The odd thing is, I've never seen one on a device like this. This mark is usually branded in to the skin of registered psychics. It makes no sense to have one on this thing – unless it works on some sort of space-warp signal. My guess is that this thing will have such a powerful psyche resonance that it will psychically blind any psychics within, say, a light-year." He replaced the charge in its foam packaging. "Including our Navigators."

Einhardt grinned. "Yeah, but orders is orders." He had his sniper rifle in his hands and was twisting on a silencer to the stock. "And personally, I just wanna get this done and get back on the ship." He slid on a scope and lifted the rifle to his eye level, checking the sights.

Jacobs walked over to the group and sat, sprawling on the grass. The squad was silent as they idly watched Einhardt replace the armor-piercing bullets in his gun with more standard rounds. He lifted the rifle and held it up to his face. He took a deep breath.

Fifteen seconds later, the body of a sparrow was falling hundreds of meters to the forest below.

Einhardt removed the rounds from the rifle and replaced them with the armor-piercing clip. He primed the weapon, and then carefully set it back on the ground.

"So where is Martin, anyway?" he said.

As if on cue, there was a crashing sound in the bushes to the left, and Captain Martin came pelting out of the forest. His hands were hauling at the slack of his pants, trying to zip them up, his eyes wide in fear.

The entire squad burst into laughter. The sight of the captain scared was so rare that it was hilarious to them. Tears streamed down Checker's face as he slapped Webber on the back. Webber winced a little.

The Captain was gibbering and pointing. The sight only made Einhardt and Checker crack up even more, but Jacobs, Keller, and Gerald stopped laughing. Jacobs was now wearing a deep frown.

"Captain?" he ventured tentatively.

That was when they heard it. The bushes were rustling. As they watched, a half a dozen little lizards emerged from the foliage. Tyranids.

They almost look as surprised to see the humans as they did to see the Tyranids. The laughter died on the lips of almost every man in the squad. Except one.

Checker bent over fluidly and grabbed his flamethrower. With his other massive hand, he brushed Webber out of the way. With a big sambo grin and a chuckle in his cheek, he stepped forward and twisted the valve on his flamer.

"H-e-e-e-y, ladies, watch out! Barbecue tonight, eh?"

A jet of gas erupted from the muzzle of his weapon, instantly ignited by a tiny flame. Flames leapt forward and licked the flesh from the aliens, leaving only charred corpses, engulfed by red-hot flames.

Minutes later, the only evidence of the passage of the men were the charred corpses and the smoke slowly coiling into the sky.

Planet Rynadon

7.09.40185

The truck trundled slowly up the primitive dirt road, the company flag tied to it limp. It sloshed through puddles of mud as it climbed a mild incline toward the small settlement. Commander Perrell, sitting in the shotgun seat, peered through the slightly frosted, bulletproof glass, leaned back, and sighed. There was commotion in the town. A fight was inevitable here.

Perrell leaned out of the window, signaling to the truck driving next to him. The driver nodded, then, one hand on the steering wheel, twisted around to a man in the back seat, who nodded as the driver said something. The man lifted the mouthpiece of a vox-caster to his mouth and began to talk. Perrell untucked his earpiece from behind his right ear and put it in. A burst of static rushed forward, then solidified.

"…proceed to West side of settlement. Units Alpha 7, Alpha 8, Alpha 9, Bravo 7, Bravo 8, and Bravo 9, fall back and provide artillery support. Tank squads Tau 1, Tau 2, and Tau 4, reinforce Eastern positions and engage wherever possible. Over and out."

"Alpha 7, copy that. Over and out."

"Alpha 8, copy. Over and out."

"Alpha 9, I copy. Over and out."

"Bravo 7, copy. Over and out."

"Bravo 8, I copy. Over and out."

"Bravo 9, copy. Requesting permission to deploy Ogryns. Over."

Perrell pressed his earpiece in. "Negative, captain. Surprise is the key factor here." He grinned to himself. "Ogryns wouldn't be very subtle, would they?"

"Roger. No, they wouldn't, sir. I apologize."

A new voice suddenly broke in – a private.

"Report! Report contact! On the East! 'Nids moving – they're – "

The private's voice trailed off, ending with a sudden burst of static. Perrell pressed his earpiece in and yelled at the private. "Private! Answer me! What are they doing? Are they attacking?" He removed his finger from the earpiece and waited expectantly, heart pounding.

The private came back online, speaking slowly. "Pardon, Commander, it just seems that they're… leaving."

One of the captains chimed in, confirming the report. All of a sudden, voices filled the channel, all of them seeming bewildered, because they all were seeing the same thing.

The Tyranids were leaving, with only a high column of dust to mark their passage.


	5. Chapter 2 Part 2

Planet Rynadon

Planet Rynadon

7.09.40185

Martin's unit was tired, deadly so. Walking in the hot, stuffy undergrowth of Rynadon was not what they were accustomed to doing. Hell, it was the Catachan Guard usually reserved for this, not Cadians, used to fighting on big, open battlefields, watching their buddies getting cut down by incoming fire, jumping over trenches and attacking the enemy with ferocious battle howls. All this trooping through the jungle was almost an insult to their abilities. In a way.

So when Checker finally cracked and made the mistake of yelling at the captain, the rest of the unit was by his side, at least mentally, if not physically.

"Why the hell are we in this damn jungle, anyway? All I want right now is a fuckin' shower and a young girl in my bed!"

The situation would have been almost comical to the privates if they had not been quaking in anticipation of Martin's rebuke. Even Checker, easily a foot and a half taller than the captain, dropped back a little, as if unconsciously trying to hide, waiting with bated breath. Martin could be unpredictable.

The captain stared at Checker for a moment. Then his face turned red and angry, and he began to draw a breath for a huge outburst.

There was a sudden flash, as if of lightning, and a white-hot beam lanced out and passed through Martin's head. As the privates stared, their gazes transfixed in horror, it exploded, and the headless body swayed for a moment, and then dropped to the ground and stayed there.

Jacobs was the first to recover his senses. He swung his weapon up and around and, with an unearthly yell, fired into the undergrowth. Chattering cries filled the jungle, and a dead Tyranid fell forward, half out of a bush.

The rest of the squad, becoming alert, opened fire with similar cries. The red flames of Checker's weapon sent the foliage up in smoke, as he charged forward. The rest of the squad followed suit, leaning into their triggers to compensate for kickback. The guns grew warm as lasburst after lasburst tore through the undergrowth.

Jacobs was plunging through the forest right behind Checker, firing at any slight movement he saw, when a feral scream ripped through his earpiece. He looked back over his shoulder and saw Edward being dragged into the foliage by a single scaly, black claw. His chest was clawed open, and Jacobs could see the heart still pumping as Edward kicked weakly at a Tyranid that had just jumped out of the bush, to bend over and tear at the man's heart. The screaming stopped.

Jacobs turned away, feeling sick, and stumbled. He froze for a second as the ground came hurtling up, but he had hardly hit the ground when he was yanked up by the scruff of his neck, and then he was running again, running next to Einhardt.

"Do that again, man," said Einhardt, puffing, "and I'm leavin' you behind."

Jacobs grinned feebly. Einhardt seemed stronger than he looked, as he was carrying the heavy sniper rifle with one hand and blasting away with a laspistol in his other hand.

Ahead of him, Jacobs saw Checker struggling through a gap in the foliage, disappearing into whatever lay beyond. Jacobs dived through the bushes, landing hard on his shoulder and rolling past Checker, lasrifle tucked into his stomach to protect it. He came up kneeling on one knee, leveling his weapon at the bended figure in front of him, who straightened and turned to face him. Jacobs vaguely registered that he was in another open clearing perched on a cliff, and then focused on the face before him.

His mouth dropped open.

The face staring at him was not a truly human one. It was vaguely reminiscent of a human face – the nose and mouth were certainly there – but it had an alien quality. It was as if the flesh had been sucked from the face, leaving only skin and bones. One of the eyes had been shrunken, and was completely black, and the other was bloody and the iris an unnaturally vivid shade of green. The hair was stringy and matted with a dark liquid – possibly blood. It had two arms, but one was covered in some sort of odd fungus. Several angular, alien limbs, ending in sharp claws, protruded from the thing's back. The torso was covered in an odd webbing of black, scaly skin, and as Jacobs watched, a tail appeared and hovered by the creature's side, moving forward probingly, almost tentatively. The thing took a step forward, and the tail move forward, towards his face –

Jacobs fired.

The creature gave a sudden hiss as it stepped backwards, but Jacobs sensed that it felt more surprise than pain. Part of the tail lay on the ground, and with a lurch of his stomach, Jacobs saw that it was still flopping weakly in its pool of blood.

The creature opened its sunken, lopsided mouth, and Jacobs was taken aback as it began to speak.

"Beware, human," it said. Its voice was a grating croak, the overtones forming scratchy, agonizing disharmonies. "Don't interfere here. You can't even comprehend what you're dealing with – "

Jacobs heard a whine somewhere above and behind him, and threw himself sideways, lying prone on the ground. As he watched, one of the many limbs of the creature simply separated from the body, spinning off into the forest. This time, it screeched, obviously in pain, and stumbled sideways.

It stepped off the cliff, falling away with another horrible scream, which petered away to nothing.

Jacobs spat over the edge.

Planet Rynadon

7.10.40185

Liever woke up, and the first thing he noticed was the pain. Or lack of it.

His ribs seemed perfectly fine, and all his other injuries, although he felt a little strange, a bit _funny_ inside. He dismissed it in his mind.

Time to see what was what. He decided on cracking an eyelid. Safe, he reckoned. What could happen if he opened one eye? He went for it.

At first it seemed quite dark. Then his vision adjusted and he realized he was looking down the barrel of a gun.

Ah, well, he thought. That's what I get for trying something new.

He decided to attempt some sort of vocalization. What could I say, he thought, that wouldn't sound too threatening? Hello, he finally decided. A nice undertone of promoting good relations.

"Whathefug?" he mumbled sleepily. Darn. Overdoing it.

The gun barrel jumped. He heard sudden laughter, and a voice saying, "Holy shit!" He winced as the sound attacked his brain like a drill. He still had a whammy of a headache, for some reason. Starting to become fully conscious, he opened both eyes more fully. The barrel of the gun had been replaced by the face of a veritable giant. He was frowning.

"I guess he's alive after all. Thanks to you, Jacobs. He looks pretty beat up." The giant glanced sideways, then got up and walked away. Liever saw he was carrying the gun he had slept with, looking at it with an appalled look on his face. Another face – Jacobs, Liever presumed – came into his field of vision.

"Good to see you're awake bud. We had to fix you up; you had three broken ribs and some assorted cuts and bruises. A couple medipacks and you were right as rain." He smiled down at Liever. "I think the 'nids got you and thrashed you. We found you with one of them, a half-human hybrid sort of thing. Do you know what they wanted with you?"

"Mr. Jacobs…" began Liever. He propped himself on his elbows and surveyed his surroundings. He was in a completely unfamiliar clearing, and the sun was just rising over the edge of the cliff. A collection of tired looking men was lying around the clearing. One of them was playing with a large device that looked like some sort of radio and was emitting bursts of static and erratic words. The men were all dressed in what Liver recognized as some sort of combat uniforms. "I don't even know what a 'nid _is_, let alone what they would want from me." He looked up into the face of the private. "All I know is they did something to my head. Like some kind of brain attack."

The lines on Jacobs' face deepened as he frowned. He bit his lip, as if thinking hard. He surveyed Liever for a moment, finally replying in a slow voice, as if carefully choosing his words. "Here's the thing, son. You're planet's been attacked by aliens."

The statement felt so out of place, so comical, that Liever started laughing, and even Jacobs, realizing the irony of his words, chuckled softly. "Yes, son, it's true. But these are not the big-headed, green, peaceful aliens you heard silly stories about when you were a kid." His smile faded. "These are bloodthirsty, vicious aliens, who will just as soon eat you as look at you. They look like lizards, although they're more like insects, in that they have completely obedient servants and a few hive minds."

The laughter had died from Liever's face. He was looking over at the man with the radio, who had gotten it to work and was now listening intently to a scratchy message being played: "…alpha 7, the Tyranids have retreated. We have entered the town and discovered the inhabitants" – Here a large and sudden burst of static, quickly fading as the radioman twisted dials and knobs – "…marking strange behavior of the Tyranids. For some reason the organic material has not been ingested, indicating possible new hierarchal figures. Status report from the fifty-seventh regiment: casualties are minimal, beta 2…" Then there was some more about some man Liever didn't know, named Perrell.

Liever struggled into a sitting position, looking at Jacobs, who for some reason, looked a little nervous. "What did that mean? 'Possible new hierarchal figures…' And what was that bit about organic material?"

Jacobs was definitely feeling uncomfortable now. He spoke even slower now. "Well… you remember what I said about the Tyranids having hive minds, right?" Liever nodded. "Well, this report makes it sound as if they've… got a new one, or something." Liever nodded again, slowly. "And the stuff about ingesting organic material…" He seemed unable to find the right words.

Checker came back over, squatted, and looked at Jacobs, directing his words to him. "I'll tell him, Jacobs. Someone has to and I don't think you've got the guts, somehow."

"Corporal – " began Jacobs, warningly.

Checker turned to Liever, heedless. "Boy, the Tyranids are genetic masters. All the organic shit they can find, they eat it. What they don't eat, they kill and leave to rot. Everyone you ever knew, in your entire life, is dead. I'm sorry to have to break it to you, kid, but you're on your own in this big wide universe."

And with that, Checker got up, turned, and walked away to sit on the edge of the cliff.

The soldiers introduced themselves to Liever, one by one, throughout the evening. Jacobs provided him with a blanket and some supper. The soldier couldn't seem to look him in the eye. Finally, everyone was asleep except Liever, who lay under his blanket, staring at the stars.

His eyes filled with tears at the thought of all the people he would never see again; all the townsfolk, his mother, his father, his younger sister.

And Alicia.

All slaughtered, like cattle, for the purposes of food.

A hatred hotter than any he had ever felt before coursed through Liever's body. His veins felt on fire; his head felt like it would burst, sending his delicate tendrils of thought flying through the universe.

Lying there, staring at the stars, Liever made a vow that he would pursue vengeance, in her name, until his enemy was utterly destroyed, could not exist at all. And only then, he knew, could he grieve.  
And then he might not feel so sad.

Planet Rynadon

7.11.40185

As daybreak crested the wide rim of the planet on which he stood, the monstrous creature that had fought the soldiers felt the human part of him fill with awe and wonder at the spectacle before him. In its other life, its _worthless_ life, it would have wasted precious time staring at the sunrise, perhaps lyrically describing it in its mind. It would have been able to stay in the one place for hours, transfixed.

The thing turned away. Humans were unfathomable, even when it had been one. Their lives were so frivolous, so _useless_ – sometimes it even wondered how they lived with themselves. The monster had been quick to reject that pointless life, to accept its _true_ life, its _real _life.

His life as the new Hive Lord of the superior Tyranid race.


	6. Chapter 3

Chapter 3

**Chapter 3**

"I talked to him right after the siege of Bahrkenahr. It was, of course, another glorious victory for Liever Johnson, just another stripe on his outfit. I don't remember what was said, but I do remember that his eyes were bright – bright, I thought, with the thrill of victory.

But the reason I remember his bright eyes was because I later realized that they were not bright with victory, but bright with tears."

_-Liet Jacobs_

Planet Rynadon

7.11.40185

Jacobs awoke slowly. His eyelids, still droopy, opened slowly. He yawned hugely and stretched with none of the creaks and pops of joints that plagued most of the soldiers of the Imperial Guard. He grunted and yawned again as he reached to his right, dragging his field pack over to his field cot. Propping his head up on one hand, he rummaged through the bag, still blinking and rubbing the sleep from his eyes. He came up with a little bottle and a pack of sausages, seeing ruefully that the sausages were slightly squashed.

When the rest of the soldiers came around, similarly yawning and stretching, it was to find Jacobs sitting glumly at a small fire, making sausages. He wordlessly dished them out, and Checker helped himself to two. Jacobs made no objection, busy staring into the fire and occasionally glancing over at Liever, still asleep at the edge of the clearing.

Einhardt was the first to approach him, grabbing a camp plate and sausage and then squatting down next to Jacobs, who was still staring morosely into the flames. Einhardt sat in silence for a minute, eating the sausage. When the last bits of stuffing had disappeared from his plate, he spoke.

"Look," he said. "Most of us feel pretty bad about what happened last night. The captain – "

"Yeah," said Jacobs distractedly, throwing another glance at Liever. Einhardt followed his gaze.

"You're worried about the kid?" said Einhardt, astonished. Jacobs said nothing, just stared into the fire. "Look, he's lucky to be alive. The Guard will – "

"The Guard won't do anything," said Jacobs shortly. "They won't give a damn about him. He's on his own out here. No family, no one to care for him – I'm not sure that he wouldn't be better off dead."

"How can you say that?" retorted Einhardt angrily. "How the hell can you say that?"

Jacobs just shook his head, almost imperceptibly. Checker called over. "Leave him alone, Einhardt. Just leave it."

Einhardt stood, shaking his head disgustedly. Jacobs shot another glance at Liever, who was stirring. Quietly, he speared a sausage and held it over the fire to cook.

Several minutes later, Liever walked dopily over to the fire, stumbling slightly with sleep and rubbing his eyes. Jacobs dropped the cooked sausage on one of the biodegradable, paper-ish plates that field soldiers called camp plates, proffering it to Liever, who accepted it gratefully, gobbling it down hungrily.

"Ish der any mur?" he inquired, mouth full.

Jacobs nodded. "Here, catch." He grabbed the package of sausages and tossed it to Liever, then pointed. "Snap off a branch from one of those dead trees and whittle it. Then spear your sausage and cook it."

"Whittle?" asked Liever, having swallowed his food.

"Sharpen it," said Jacobs. "You can borrow my knife, it's in the green bag over there." He pointed at the bag. "Bring the stick and the knife over here, and I'll show you how."

"Oh, that's okay," said Liever. "I know how to…" He looked as if he were struggling to remember the word.

"Whittle?" prompted Jacobs.

"Yeah. I know how to whittle." Jacob walked across the clearing to a small pile of deadwood at the edge of the clearing, near where he had slept. He selected a small, sturdy branch. "I've just never heard it called that before." He walked back, squatting down to rummage through the bag. "Which pocket is it in?"

"The little one on the side," answered Jacobs. "It's about five inches long, dark red."

Liever eventually came up with a small knife. He studied it as he walked over, stick in hand, to where Jacobs was sitting. He sat on the same dead log as the veteran soldier. Flicking the knife open, he began to shave the wood in silence. Jacobs watched him out of the corner of his eye, occasionally taking a swig from the bottle at his side. Liever sharpened his stick and speared the sausage upon it. Then he spoke.

"So who's Lillian?" he asked.

Jacobs froze. Then the faintest of shadows covered his face, and his eyebrows drew in just a fraction. "She's just… a friend."

"Oh, come on," wheedled Liever. "Just a friend, and you're carrying around a knife with her name engraved on it?" As he spoke, he lifted the penknife to Jacobs' eye level. He tilted it so that the edge of the flat of the blade caught in the reflection of the almost fully risen sun. _Love, L. A._ The letters were barely half a millimeter tall.

Jacobs laughed softly. "You're sharper than you look, young man. How'd you know her full name, then?"

Liever winked and grinned. "Well, when you tattoo her name on your arm…"

Jacobs unconsciously tilted his arm slightly, hiding the ink that read, _Lillian Andel._ Looking down, he laughed again, then, changing the subject, asked Liever what he had said his name was.

Liever looked down. "I didn't," he said. "But it's Liever Johnson."

"Hmm," said Jacobs thoughtfully. "But am I right in presuming that people call you Leaf?" Now it was his turn to wink as he Liever looked up sharply. Then the young boy returned his gaze to the heart of the fire. "No one calls me anything anymore."

Jacobs felt like he had just accidentally slapped Liever. "I'm sorry, boy," he said. "I didn't mean it like that. Liever it is, then?"

Liever just shrugged. Feeling he should leave the boy alone, Jacobs got up and walked to the edge of the cliff.

"Jacobs?"

The soldier turned around.

Liever looked suddenly old and tired, beyond his years, as if he had seen too many things that he did not want to see. It was the same look that Keller, the oldest veteran, often wore. Jacobs felt a sudden stab of pity for the young man.

"Just… just Liever."

Jacobs nodded and turned away to allow the lad some privacy so that he could wipe away his tears.

Planet Rynadon

7.11.40185

Commander Perrell stood in the middle of the square with a look of grim determination. He directed his soldiers as they moved the dead corpses of the villagers out of the city square, depositing them in makeshift graveyards on the outskirts of town. The small farms were being uprooted to make way for the dead, but Perrell didn't really care. There was very little chance that anyone would be living in this village in the future.

Coming into the city square and seeing the bodies lined up, with such a neat and horrible precision, Perrell had been momentarily astonished. In all the experience he had had with Tyranids – and it was certainly a lot – he could never have predicted this. Humans disappeared off the face of the earth during a Tyranid invasion. Their bodies would be eaten before they had been dead for ten seconds. Indeed, he had known Tyranids to eat things that were still struggling. But this… he surveyed the massacre. This was odd. Very odd.

He turned to the man next to him, wearing subdued, jet-black and clothing and a helmet that completely covered his face.

"The more I learn about these aliens, the more I come to understand what drives them, the more I hate them," said Perrell in a offhand voice. "I hate them for what they are and for what they may one day become. I hate them not because they hate us but because they are incapable of good, honest, human hatred."

The faceless man cocked his head slightly. A heavily filtered, unrecognizable voice issued forth. "Agmar? Inquisitor Agmar, I believe."

Perrell chuckled. "You are the only man for several miles who would dare to not at least address me as sir, but yes, you are correct."

The man leaned back in the seat. "I thought so," he said. "It's in the scriptures, page twenty-eight. The basics of tactical shooting." There was a hint of amusement in his voice.

"True." Perrell pressed his earpiece and caught a bit of conversation between two techies somewhere. Something about an input line.

Perrell shook his head viciously, wondering where in the world Captain Martin was.

Planet Rynadon

7.11.40185

The squad was standing around the dead body of Captain Martin. It was a gruesome sight. A large chunk of his head had been sliced out, exposing soft, gray brain matter. The Tyranids had had some time to get at him, so while his torso to his hips was relatively unscathed, his legs where shredded into stringy bits of flesh, with apparent bite marks.

Gerald bent down and reached into the vest pocket of the Captain's uniform. He pulled out a set of orders and a pack of cigarettes. Reaching into one of his pockets, he pulled out a match, put one of the coffin nails in his mouth, lit the match on his teeth, and lit up. Then he placed the pack of cigs in his pocket, shook out the match, tossed it over his shoulder, and took a long drag, unrolling the sheet of orders as he did so.

"_Order 177985, reference Mark II,_" he read aloud. "Yadda yadda yadda… looks good, boys." He plucked the cigarette from between his teeth and offered it to Jacobs, who shook his head. Checker reached over and took it, drawing deeply with his eyes closed.

Einhardt laughed. "You read that wrong, man. Mark II?"

Gerald studied the orders. "Did I? No, look, it's right there." He held out the paper to Einhardt, who took it. Jacob read over his shoulders, then took the orders when Einhardt handed them to him.

Checker was on his second drag, his eyes open. Then he pulled the cig from his mouth. He held it inches from his mouth as he began blowing smoke rings. The smoke rose and was whisked away by a sudden light breeze that set the tops of the trees in motion.

Jacobs was folding up the orders and putting them away. "Well, there's nothing like following orders. Let's just do it and get off this backwater planet."

Keller leaned forward, speaking for the first time in a low voice that sounded like gravel. "And… the boy?"

Jacob's shoulders sagged. His eyes seemed to withdraw, as if looking inside himself, at his past. He spoke slowly, with all the fatigue and sadness of the battle-hardened soldier he was. "The boy… I don't know. I just don't know."

He turned slowly and walked through the forest, back toward the clearing. After a short moment of silence, the soldiers turned, one by one, and followed.

All the soldiers were sitting near the remains of the smoldering fire. Einhardt was sitting cross-legged, taking slow, long, purposeful drags with a look of ecstasy on his face. Webber was kneeling next to him, his chin on one knee as he spoke softly into a transmitter and flipped switches on the small radio, which was emitting a steady hiss of static. Gerald was lying on the grass next to him, hands behind his head, staring at the clouds. To Gerald's right, Keller was fiddling with a little device that he was holding deep in his lap. Jacobs and Liever were across from them, facing each other and playing cards. Checker was strolling around the group, examining the shotgun Liever had been sleeping with.

"What the heck is this thing for, anyway?" he enquired, brandishing the solid slug weapon around and narrowly missing Webber's head. "I can't imagine you farmers having to defend yourselves against anything."

"Squirrels, you know?" said Liever. "I mean obviously one isn't going to hurt you, but sometimes if they get a big gang and really hop all over you – it's worse than it sounds," he added defensively. "I mean what would _you_ do to kill a squirrel? Tactical nukes, I suppose…"

Jacobs snorted. "Bit like sand-blasting a soup cracker, really," he said. He dropped his hand down, face up. "Two pair."

"Full house beats your two pair," said Liever, throwing down his cards. "So any luck with that radio, Webber?"

Webber exhaled in frustration, running a hand through his close-cropped brown hair and shaking his head. He flicked a switch in a futile kind of way.

"Mmm-hmmm," said Liever. "Mind if I give it a go?"

Webber shot a glance at Jacobs, who responded by raising a hand palm up and raising a shoulder, as if to say, _Why not?_ Webber shrugged his shoulders indifferently, got up, switched places with Liever, picked up the cards, and started shuffling.

Liever grabbed the transmitter and held it close to his mouth. Flipping two switches and then twisting a knob slowly, he spoke loudly and clearly into the transmitter. "Testing. Testing. Vivacious villains vehemently vivisect viral vegetables – "

" – Say that five times fast – "

"Shut up, man… Broadcasting on coded frequency four hundred and eighty-five…"

A voice suddenly burst from the mesh speakers; a voice that made most of the squad leap to their feet in shock and Checker to dodge forward and snatch the transmitter from Liever's hand: "This is Commander Perrell! Identify yourself, son! What unit are you part of, and why the hell are you on this channel?"

Checker held the transmitter to his mouth and started speaking rapidly. "Veteran Unit Gamma 8, sir. The Captain is out of commission and the squad has sustained casualties. Do we have orders, over?"

The radio was silent for several seconds but for a strange, regular clicking. Then the Commander's voice came back, slowly, faintly. "Private, did you say the Captain was… dead?" He sounded distracted.

Checker spoke. "Yes sir, killed by a Tyranid attack. We're not sure what – "

Commander Perrell cut him off, his voice still slow. "Copy that, Private. I, uh – just – here are your orders. I want you to keep going toward your objective, until I can dispatch relief. Over and out."

The receiver filled with static. Checker turned a perplexed face toward the surviving veterans. Liever was the first to break the silence.

"So just what are we 'sposed to do now?"

Planet Rynadon

7.11.40185

Commander Perrell pulled his finger off of his ear, a worried look on his face. His brow furrowed, he stared through the windshield of the command Jeep, gazing at the horizon. Next to him, the man in black turned his head and tilted it forward a fraction, his expression unfathomable.

Perrell turned suddenly, his usually military crispness immediately restored. "Captain Martin has been murdered by Tyranids, his mission unfulfilled."

The mysterious man betrayed no surprise at these words except for an almost imperceptible twitch of his head.

"I'm going to send a relief team to find his squad," continued Perrell. He sighed in a melodramatic way. "However, I'm afraid that they might die in a tragic accident before the team can arrive." He waved his hand in a careless way. "Use your imagination."

Perrell resumed passively staring at the skyline in a pensive manner. He scantly noticed the nod of the man in black, or when he exited the vehicle. He was so absorbed in his thoughts that he didn't notice the fabric of the black jumpsuit shimmer, as if underwater, and then suddenly disappear like the wink of an eye. And he didn't see the gas-like shimmer in the air that bobbed out of the town and into the forest in the direction of Captain Martin's unsuspecting squad.


	7. Chapter 4 Part 1

Chapter 4 Chapter 4

"Let me tell you eager young men a story. Once there was a man who lived in a mountain, and ate only rice and fish and was very wise. He spent most of his day meditating. One day, a young man, just like most of you, came to his cottage to seek 'wisdom'. The old man brought him to his rain barrel and told him to drink from it and he might become wise. While the young man drank, the wise man plunged his head in and held it there for thirty seconds. Then he pulled the man back up.

"'When your head was submerged in my rain barrel, what did you most wish for?' asked the wise man.

"'Air!' replied the young man, gasping.

"'Anything else?' the wise man asked.

"'No! Just air!' said the young man.

"'When you are willing to risk everything for wisdom – when you need it more than the air – come back and I may teach you,' said the man, walking away.

"Now, my young recruits, are _you_ willing to risk everything for _me_? Do you wish for the glory I could grant you more than you wish for your lives? Are you ready to follow me into the pits of hell?"

_-Liever Johnson, addressing recruits for the Typhozid campaign_

Planet Rynadon

7.11.40185

Under Liever's expert guidance, the remains of Captain Martin's squad had made good progress through the jungle of Rynadon. They had not met any resistance, and from all points of view, it seemed as though the Tyranids had, inexplicably, vanished from the planet. As the squad listened to the radio, it became increasingly evident that there was no presence anywhere on the surface or is space; commander Perrell's great flagship, _Sirrah's Pride_, had detached probes to search the nearby space, and there were reported sightings of smaller Tyranid craft moving into warp space. Fighting troops were all reporting an absence of Tyranid activity. Meanwhile, Jacobs was chatting with Liever. Liever told his childhood story, a child with no known father whose mother walked into the settlement, had a child, and died within the hour. He had been cared for by a couple, the Johnsons, who were too old to have any children, but desperately wanted one. Curiously enough, he had remained unnamed by his mother, and at the age of two, the Johnsons named him Liever after the hero of his favorite folktale. Liever related the tale as they walked. Then Jacobs told him how he had been an orphan since he could remember, a hapless baby, swaddled in a blanket, tucked into the dark corner of a cargo hold sent from Terra to Cadia. He told him about growing up during the years of the trip, being cared for by a custodian named Fletcher, sneaking around with his band of stowaways, occasionally stealing from the weary people who pursued their pointless lives, then enlisting in the Cadian Guard service and fighting in the defense of the Cadian Gate from the Eye of Chaos before being sent on the journey that landed him… here. But where was here?

"You're on Planet Rynadon," said Liever. "One of the myriads of backwater planets of the Imperium… until now, I guess. You know, before a few days ago, the Imperium was closer to a story than a fact. I used to hear stories about the billions of men in shining armor who stood in an invulnerable, gleaming bulwark against the common foes of mankind." He laughed, but it was short and harsh.

The poor kid, thought Jacobs. After everything that's happened to him, I'd hardly be surprised if he was never able to laugh properly again. Aloud, he said, "I only wish we were invulnerable. Your average soldier is only cannon fodder, to be thrown at the enemy and to die. In the Guard, the death of one man is a tragedy, but the death of a million men is merely a statistic."

Liever looked sideways at the old veteran as they trudged through the jungle. "Why do you talk like that? You seem so… philosophical."

Jacobs raised a shoulder. "I read a lot, I guess. Not a lot to do on board a spaceship bound for nowhere." He cocked an eyebrow. "No offense."

Liever laughed again, the same short, hard bark. "Well, it looks like Rynadon is starting to be somewhere, after all. Aliens and Artifacts."

Just then, they heard a beeping noise coming from Einhardt, ahead of them. He unclipped a little device from his belt and stared at the liquid crystal readout for several seconds. Then he spoke. "Our target is a couple of kilometers due west. It looks like it's in a place the colonists used to call…" he squinted at the display. "…No-Man's bog."

"Oh, shit," said Liever.

Everyone turned to look at him. Checker growled, "You know this place, kid?"

Liever nodded. "Rynadon was a toxic wasteland before the first colonists arrived. Conditions were rough, but they somehow managed to set up a terraforming station. It took held well – hell, generally it worked better than in most systems." He gestured to the dense surrounding jungle. "Actually, most of this is in the last century or two. That's how recently we got here."

Webber shook his head. "What does this have to do with anything?"

Liever hesitated. "Well, the terraforming – wasn't perfect. For reasons no one could fathom, certain patches not only rejected supporting any sort of life, but also reverted to wasteland a few years after the initial terraforming. No-Man's bog is one of those places." He pointed to the west. "It's about a kilometer and a half long stretch of thirteen-feet-deep mud and geysers spewing carbon monoxide. It's in such high concentration that if you were fifty feet above one of the geysers and there was no wind – and there usually isn't much, on Rynadon – you'd die in seconds."

"How long exactly?" said Webber.

Liever raised a shoulder. "Does it really matter?"

Jacobs watched the youth. Was it just him, or did Liever's eyes seem to be sliding around a little too much? And did he detect a shifty tone to his voice?

"That's not all, either," Liever was saying. "There's Radon seeping from the ground, exposed sulfur deposits, an extremely volatile substance that they're calling Bracidon… there's more, but it'll just upset you. There are maybe fourteen different ways to kill yourself in there."

Checker shrugged. "Well, no problem. We've got gas masks."

Liever was shaking his head. "Won't work. There's probably only so much those things can handle. Anyway, all the gas displaces the oxygen, CO2, nitrogen, etcetera. You'd asphyxiate." He thought for a second. "I guess that makes fifteen ways to kill yourself."

Jacobs laughed, but something was tugging at him. He was suspicious about Liever's story, but he couldn't say just what it was. Anyway, why would the kid be lying?

Einhardt spoke. "So what would you suggest, boy?"

Liever shrugged again. "Aside from a magical bubble full of air, I can't really suggest any really safe method. Your best bet is to get some oxygen tanks or something and dash in there."

Webber snapped his fingers. "We've definitely got a couple of ten-minute air canisters. Me and Einhardt will go in there, plant the charge, and get out."

"Well…" said Liever. He seemed reluctant.

"Yes?" ground Einhardt expectantly.

"Just… don't light a match," said Liever, as if giving up. Then he grinned. "And don't fart."

Einhardt shook his head in mock disgust as they all turned to the West and began again to make their way through the thick undergrowth of Rynadon. "What a planet."


	8. Chapter 4 Part 2

Transit ship

Transit ship

In Orbit over Planet Rynadon

7.11.40185

Past the glass plates of the shuttle, Rynadon stretched magnificently across the black, fragile velvet of space. Light clouds drifted with almost imperceptible slowness across the single continent. Small asteroids fell into the atmosphere and burned up instantly.

Commander Perrell turned from the spectacle in front of him, staring instead through a different window at his flagship, _Sirrah's Pride_. The hulking behemoth was very unglamorous at first glance, but Perrell knew it to be a fast, powerful, battle-hardened ship indeed. Laser marks and photon burns pockmarked the side of it, testimony to battle with Eldar, Orks, and other even fouler creatures.

As the shuttle moved closer to the ship, Perrell turned to his companion, a man almost as battle-scared as the ship itself. An ugly scar stretched from his cheek to over his temple, a badge of courage from a charge on the fields of Tyrok. His nose had been smashed so much that it was crooked, and the officer's cap he affected concealed an ear that looked as though it had almost been ripped off. The seal he wore proudly above his heart identified him as a First Lieutenant, Fifty-Seventh Regiment. Gold letters sown into the collar of his stiff military uniform identified him as Lawrence Abulard.

"Any news from the The Father, Lieutenant?" said Perrell.

A frown of annoyance stretched Abulard's scar as his brows contracted. "Must we use that ridiculous name?"

"Yes, we must," replied Perrell, a little sharply.

"We're alone."

"We're never alone."

"I told you, I've scanned this rusty bucket of bolts, and – "

"And you found no audio or visual devices."

"Precisely."

"When you deal in secrets, there's no substitute for good old fashioned paranoia." The commander ran his hands down his uniform, smoothing out subtle creases. "So, have you spoken with him?"

The grizzled Lieutenant turned to face the glass plate, examining the looming battleship. "No. But I have spoken with the Inquisitor."

The commander turned sharply, alarmed. "The Inquisitor? I had The Father's assurance that he would not be interfering with our activities here!"

Lawrence frowned at this reaction. "The Father is not as powerful as you think. If the Witch Hunters believe they need to investigate, there's little anyone can do to stop them. They have every right to bring their forces – "

"They're coming here in force? I can't have anyone here go through an examination!"

Lawrence turned to his superior. "Why not? What have you to hide?"

Perrell's only answer was to turn to the glass and watch as the shuttle moved alongside the ship. It floated aimlessly around a pair of gigantic bay doors, then slipped inside as they opened. Once inside the doors, the shuttle settled to the ground, the bay doors closing behind. Small robots scurried around, clamping the shuttle to a magnetic rail. It shot off, through white corridors, finally slowing, then coming to a rest flush against airlock doors.

There was a hiss as the airlock prepared to open.

"Remember," said Perrell, "follow my lead and don't give more away than you have to. Don't lie, though. The Father will know."

The doors opened and the two men walked forward. Through a door, a left at the second door, down a flight of steps, through another corridor, and they arrived in an open room with a row of elevators. Perrell pressed a button and stood, waiting.

Just then, a courier walked up. "Commander Perrell, sir." He saluted.

Perrell turned. "Yes, what is it?"

"A message for you, sir."

The commander took the message and read it. With every line, his face grew slightly paler and his hawkish eyes narrower. When he finished, he stared off into space, turning the letter over in his hand. Then he handed it to Lawrence.

Commander Perrell,

I have recently arrived aboard your ship from a nearby system. I would like you to meet me, and we may discuss a pending investigation into the activities in this system. Please note that to not comply completely with any investigation the Ordo Xeno makes probably will bring the wrath of the forces of the Ordo upon the investigation.

I am to be received in docking bay 13b.

-Inquisitor Torres

"Inquisitor Torres," said Perrell, several minutes later.

The Inquisitor turned from a huge window, looking Perrell up and down through eyes shrouded by a tattered hood. Seeming satisfied, he spoke quietly. "Yes."

"Please, have a seat over here," said Perrell, gesturing to a row of chairs in front of the window, overlooking Rynadon. Torres nodded and moved over. They all sat down.

"So, what is your business here?" said Perrell. Lawrence thought: _He's playing it safe. Good._

"I've come to discuss the possibility of an Inquisitorial investigation in the Rynadon System. I am a representative from the Ordo Xenos. Our ships were purging a world with holy fire only a few systems away when we received the message of this artifact."

"That sounds in order. We are ready to undergo an investigation." Perrell smiled. "We have nothing to hide."

_Or do you, Commander?_ Wondered Lawrence privately.

Lawrence had had mistrust for Commander Perrell since he had been put under his command. In his old regiment, Lawrence had served seven distinguished years of service, earning many medals and badges, until he had been transferred to Commander Perrell, who took a curious liking to him and made him his personal assistant. Lawrence had come to learn the subtle and manipulating ways of politics, and despite his mistrust of the Commander, he had come to respect his gift for speaking in riddles.

However, all during their time on Rynadon, Perrell had seemed shifty – as if he was, indeed, hiding something. Lawrence hoped that the Inquisition would not unearth anything damaging.

The Inquisitor spoke. "My main concern is why you seem to have disregarded your orders. We have held this system in lockdown for many years now, and I would like to know why you made it your business to interfere here."

Perrell opened his mouth for a moment, then closed it, a puzzled expression on his face. After another moment, he said, "Under lockdown? But – I don't – I mean, there are people here – "

Torres cut him off with a curt nod, but Lawrence couldn't help but notice the hood tremble for a moment, as if the man underneath were plagued by some uncertainty. And yet when the Inquisitor spoke again, Lawrence knew he must have been imagining it, for his voice was as cold and hard as ever. "We are aware of that. What we want to know is what you are doing in a system where you certainly have no business." There was no mistaking now the sharp tone of malice in his voice.

Perrell shrugged. "Well – I mean to say – our orders were to engage Tyranids," he gestured out of the huge window, "and here they are… so, under the circumstances, I just thought…"

"Very well," the Inquistor said, gathering himself up and standing. "I will now return to our ship and report the results of this conversation."

"What – you're leaving already?" said Lawrence, unable to hide his astonishment.

Torres eyed him coldly. "Oh yes, I think so. I have learned what I needed to. And by the way," he added, directing his words towards Perrell, "I'll need a data copy of those orders." With that, he strode off towards his shuttle, beckoning towards a technician.

Perrell and Lawrence turned and looked at each other. The Lieutenant spoke first.

"What the hell was that all about?"

Inquisitorial Ship _Cortanis_

Location Confidential

7.11.40185

The shuttle cruised over the blacked-out hull of the _Cortanis_, skimming over the pitch-black metal plating. The shuttle was short and tapered to a blunt nose, with two stubby wings on either side in the back. Its engines cast a soft blue glow into the endless black fabric of space.

The shuttle slowed down as it approached the sunward side, the light from Rynadon's dim sun glinting dully off its slowly retracting wings. It slid low across the hull, and then a set of huge bay doors opened up and it sank into a concealed hangar and came to rest on an utterly dark floor. As the bay doors closed high above it, it's engines turned off.

At once, halogen lights embedded in the quartz floor turned on, casting a pale, underworld glow around the bay. It was completely empty.

A door opened at the far end of the spaceship room and three men entered. An officer strode purposefully forward, flanked by two guards carrying low-power las weapons. The door closed with an echoing clang, and every step caused a sharp rap to reverberate around the room.

When the men had walked about halfway across the bay, there was a loud hiss. It stopped, then there were two clanks. A ramp lowered cinematically onto the floor, barely touching the quartz.

Somewhere on the bridge a tiny white light was blinking insistently.

Inquisitor Torres moved slowly down the ramp, his short cape swirling with every step. Meeting the officer at the bottom, they murmured a few words. Torres nodded, then walked forward, the officer and guards following at a respectful distance.

They walked across and then left the bay. As the last guard exited, he pulled the door shut with the same, echoing clang.


	9. Chapter 5

Chapter 5

**Chapter 5**

"There is a theory that tells us – and I'll tell you it in that annoying way that philosophers have – that if a man knew everything there is to know, that he would surely die alone because there is nothing to live for, no higher state of being or level of faith. But our species seems to have a collective death wish, so man's endless pursuit of knowledge shows no signs of stopping soon. Viewed one way, this is rather a boon, but viewed with what is I'm afraid an entirely more critical and correct eye, it's rather a problem. A big problem, general.

"An ork doesn't have this particular problem. The average ork – or really, any ork you happen across – is largely unconcerned with most of this bunk. You see, I'm a good deal smarter than an ork, but in the long run it wouldn't really matter. In a one-on-one with an ork, the knowledge of quantum physics locked up in this brain of mine isn't doing me a whole load of good. I'd lose, anyway. The smartest man on earth wouldn't be a match for a greenskin with a rock.

"And that, you poor, shortsighted bastard, is why your plan is not working, my men are dying out there, and you are set to abandon them. In short, general, that is why we are losing."

Planet Rynadon

7.11.40185

The mysterious man in black slinked carefully along a branch. His hands gripped the branch noiselessly as he slowly inched forward. His cloak rendered him almost perfectly invisible, more versatile than a chameleon, detectable as only slightly more than a slight whirling of colors; the effect might have been like looking at oneself through a slightly distorted pane of glass.

He stopped over the group of people sitting around a collection of glowing embers. Directly below him was easily the largest man in the group. Cutter was his name, recalled the man in black.  
" – do we do when we find the thing?" Cutter was saying, lighting a cigarette.

"Haven't we gone over this before?" growled the oldest man in the group – Gerald, thought the invisible man. The one sitting next to him, with the monkey face, must be Keller.

The short one, with the nervous face, Webber, he recalled, piped in: "I've linked up two oxygen canisters to our gas masks. It took a little improvisation, but it should work. The canisters have approximately twenty-five minutes of air in them. Me and Einhardt go in, get off, get out. No problem."

Everyone laughed. Einhardt, thought the man in black. The one over there, with the cigarette and the black anodized case. There's probably something pretty nasty in there.

"Good," said Checker. As he spoke, the man in black swung down so he was hanging by his knees next to the giant's head. Moving slowly, smoothly, he drew a small knife from the sheath at his side.

"I wouldn't want anyone to get hurt," said Cutter.

The man almost laughed at the irony. His hand moved to Cutter's throat and was about to slit it when a voice made him look up.

"Hey," said a boy he somehow had missed. Odd. He was about sixteen, by the look of him. Then an odd thought struck the mysterious assassin.

The boy was looking straight at him.

His hand slashed sideways. Cutter keeled over and was dead in three seconds.

Liever was sitting outside the group, listening and staring at his hands, his head down. He was worried about the mission they were on. He thought it was dangerous, but he wasn't sure somehow. Something seemed out of place. And he had a vague unease, something that had nothing to do with the mission. Liever was about to dismiss it.

"I wouldn't want anyone to get hurt," Cutter was saying. _Neither would I,_ thought Liever.

Suddenly, there was a sharp buzz at the base of his skull. His head snapped up almost involuntary. His eyes focused on the air above Cutter. He blinked.

Immediately, the world swam before his eyes. Colors blurred before him, swirled then solidified. When he could distinguish shapes again, he realized with a shock that there was a colorful aura around every object he could see.

He squinted. A purple aura in the shape of a human was hanging over Cutter's head.

"Hey," he said vaguely.

Cutter toppled sideways, blood streaming from his neck, dead.

"Hey," Jacobs heard Liever say.

Jacobs looked up. Cutter was already on the ground, the life gone from his eyes. He jumped up and backwards, scrabbling for his weapon. He felt the stock, grabbed it, slid his finger into the trigger guard, and pulled.

Searing lasbolts flew through the air, singing Cutter's dead flesh. Then a bolt exploded midair. Someone yelled, then the hazy outline of a kneeling person appeared.

Jacobs blinked. _What the hell?_ He thought.

The kneeling figure seemed to drip and melt, like candle wax, then the colors blurred, solidified, slid off like a sheath. They lay on the ground like a wildly colored cloak.

The man kneeling was clutching his leg, moaning. As Jacobs watched, he fell sideways.

The man in black felt a terrible pain in his ankle; he yelled and sank to his knees. He looked down to see his chameleon cloak sliding off. His body became slowly visible, revealing charred flesh at the ankle. He moaned and tentatively probed the wound with his fingers. Then the pain and shock overwhelmed him, and he fell sideways.

He probably would have lived, so he wasn't really bothered with the messy process of his life flashing before his eyes. He probably would have lived, so his only concern at the moment was his seared ankle.

Had it not been for the Tyranid that dropped from the sky and closed its teeth on his skull, he probably would have lived.

But the problem with probably, he thought miserably an instant after recognizing the teeth and an instant before they closed on his head, was that it never seemed to be quite good enough.

Liever jumped up, able to somehow _feel_ the first Tyranid that appeared from over the tops of the trees and dived, with a flap of its scaly wings and an inhuman screech, for the man in black. He spun around in time to see Einhardt swinging up onto a branch, Jacobs scrambling up just below him. He ran and leapt, grabbing a branch, pulling himself up, and –

The branch broke and Liever fell flat on his back. His breath swept out of him with a _whoosh_. He winced and gasped, his breath coming in as if through a straw. He rolled over, then pulled himself into a slumped position against the tree, eyes shut tight. Then he opened them.

Three creatures were slowly advancing upon him. They had dark red bodies, with wings sprouting sickeningly from their backs. They walked hunched forward, counterbalanced by the weight of their wings. In their hands they held strange guns that looked to Liever as if they were made out of flesh. Their heads were angled and triangular, their eyes cold, intelligent, and merciless.

A whining sound came from somewhere above Liever's head, and he looked up. Einhardt had his rifle up to his eye level, and as Liever watched, the gun flashed and jumped. His eyes flew back to the Tyranids, seeing the chest of the one on the right collapse, shooting up a blossom of blood, showering everyone with specks of dark ichor.

The remaining creatures let loose cries and ran forward, indignant at the thought of loosing their prize. The closer one took three steps and then, with another blood-curdling scream, leapt straight for Liever, tossing its gun aside, its talons fully extended –

A barrage of lasbolts impacted the thing in its face, forcing it into a mid-air sort of half-backflip. It crashed into its fellow who was running behind it, and the two landed in a clawing, tangled heap on the ground. The headless creature kicked a few times and then lay still, but the living one disentangled itself, then jumped into the air and pumped its wings, flapping away into the distance.

In the branches above Liever's head, Einhardt was calmly screwing on a silencer to his rifle's barrel. He ran his eyes over the length of the weapon, then flipped it around and did the same, taking puffs of the cigarette in his mouth. He flicked off the safety and worked the bolt, chambering a round. With one hand on the grip, he took a long, purposeful drag, before flicking the cig away. He then took the gun in his hands, nestled it in his shoulder, raised it to his eye, took aim briefly, and pulled the trigger.

A single depleted uranium shell flew through the air at a sub-sonic speed. It hit the creature in the wing joint, making it spiral down to the ground with a screech. Einhardt followed its movement with the scope, and then fired again.

Hundreds of feet away, an alien corpse crashed through the undergrowth.

Liever swore.

"Damn," growled Einhardt. "That was our last smoke."

Pirate Ship _Angelfire_

In Hyperspace Quadrant 2487b (Rynadon System)

7.11.40185

Standing in the elevator that was quickly rising to the bridge of the _Angelfire_, captain Petreias took a moment to smooth his stiff gray uniform. Although he had a tendency – hell, really more of a reputation – for severity and stiffness, he now felt jumpy, almost... nervous. But what did he have to be nervous about? He had been waiting almost his whole life for this.

A soft, pleasant sounding chime was heard. The doors in front of the captain whooshed silently open, and then closed just as quietly behind him as he stepped onto the bridge.

He strode importantly to the middle of the small white room, past half a dozen technicians controlling life support systems with holographic terminals, eventually reaching a light gray command chair. He sat down and pressed a few buttons on the side of the armrest. A control panel rose from the floor, seeming to flow up to his fingertips as if made of water and not a solid substance; yet when Petreias touched it, it was the warmth of wood and the smoothness of glass that met his fingers. At the same time, a silver cable wound around his neck from the seat, slinking behind his jawbone and coming to a stop millimeters from his ear.

"Good afternoon, captain," said a feminine voice in his ear.

"Good afternoon, Morgan," said Petreias in a voice as razor-sharp as the crew cut he wore, "or is it evening? Ever since we left Khaillion I've been feeling tired earlier." As if to prove his point, he stifled a small yawn.

"It is currently four thirty-nine in the afternoon," said the voice in his ear. In front of him, the holographic terminal powered up, displaying a flurry of dots. "I set the lights on a different timer when we lifted off." The pinpoints of light dissolved into a slender female figure. "Khaillion had a ten and a half hour day and you're probably just still used to it." The holographic woman in front of him, Morgan, tilted her head and looked at him. Her voice was high and cool, with a slight lilt that Petreias couldn't place, but liked.

"So what is it that you think you have found?"

Morgan turned, gesturing at one of the huge screens that dominated the forward wall. It lit up immediately, displaying the dark side of a planet. A sliver of sunlight danced along one side, showing ocean and some green. It was a jungle or forest world.

"Several days ago, an Imperial ship and its small fleet of escorts and fighters moved out of Warp space in this sector," she said. "For several hours, they held position in high orbit, then launched a single drop pod to the planet's surface. We've tapped into their communications network, and I've detected Tyranids here." As she spoke, several of the living bioships floated into view around the left rim of the world. Petreias whistled, then frowned.

"So what has all this got to do with us? I don't much like the idea of being on the same world with _those_ things." He waved a hand at the screen.

"Well, that's why it helps to know what the enemy is saying," said Morgan turning from the screen. The view disappeared and runes began to flash across it. "I found this in one of the private logs of the commander – an Imperial servant named Perrell. His electronic security is far from terrific," she added in an absentminded tone. "Not that it would have much mattered to me." Morgan occasionally had an odd penchant for bragging. "Anyways, have a look at – this."

Petreias leaned forward, brow furrowed, reading the log – and then his expression turned to one of shock, his eyes wide, his face pale.

"Oh, hell!" he breathed. "That bastard!"

"Quite," said Morgan.

"Is this – is it viable?"

"Of course it is. You wouldn't think I'd do that sloppy of a job, would you?"

Petreias was still reading the screen. "And he knows where it comes from and what it could do – where the hell did he learn all that? An Imperial servant – " – he made the disgust in his voice quite plain – " – somehow found out about this? Hell, I had to chase Abbadon the Despoiler himself to the very rim of the Eye of Terror just to find out whether it was a legend or not!"

The captain sat back, looking winded, still staring at the screen. "How could he have known? This is impossible! We sealed the Gate of Krystal years and years ago, the only other person who made it out – " He suddenly fell silent. Then, with a single sweeping motion, he stood up, turned on his heel, and stormed off the bridge. Morgan shimmered, then disappeared.

Seven pairs of eyes followed Petrieas off the bridge.

Inquisitorial Ship _Cortanis_

Location Confidential

7.12.40185

Torres sat in front of the holographic terminal in his private quarters, staring intently, almost hungrily, at the semidark field in front of his eyes. The small rig rested on a table, and next to it were the smoking remains of some narcotic resting in a small ashtray. The table, though small, took up nearly a third of the space in the Inquisitor's little cell. The only other thing in the room, which was tiny and cramped, was a small cot and a hard chair.

The display lit up. Seeming to be wrapped in light, a tiny man stood inches in front of the Inquisitor's face. The mouth of the tiny figure opened, and it began to speak, in a deep, hushed voice.

"Good evening, my friend. I am afraid I have some bad news."

The aged Inquisitor's brow sagged. "Yes, Captain Petrieas. I am afraid that we do."


	10. Chapter 6 Part 1

Planet Rynadon

7.12.40185

"But I mean, if he wasn't sent by Perrell, then who could it have been?" asked Liever for the umpteenth time.

Jacobs shrugged wearily. "Who knows? None of this makes any sense. Who would send an assassin against us in the first place? Nothing adds up here." He rubbed his eyes and hunched his shoulders forward towards the fire. The dusk and the darkness closing in was now beginning to feel ominous, and he doubted that he would get much sleep that night.

Webber looked around nervously. "You don't think I should… should radio in to command, or – "

"Don't be an idiot," snapped Keller. "They tried to kill us once, do you really think they'd be thrilled to hear we're still alive?"

Webber wrung his hands nervously, looking close to tears. "Well then what are we gonna _do_?" he pleaded.

Above their heads, Einhardt slowly stretched out silently along a wide branch. After being attacked, it was his idea that they move further into the forest, and now every night as they pitched tents and built fires between trees that seemed to move ever close together, he insisted on keeping watch from the trees. Now he settled with catlike balance, holding on to the lasrifle he had borrowed from Gerald, his eyes shining with moonlight as they hunted across the skies. Huddled below him were the other five men, bent toward a smoldering fire.

"We keep on the move, all the time." His voice drifted down weirdly towards them from the dark branches above. "Don't let them know where we are. They'll give up looking eventually, what's a couple troopers to an army like them? We're not a threat to them."

Webber looked around nervously again, looking for all the world like a overlarge rodent on the lookout for a bottle of poison. "Well we - I dunno – I mean, how can you be so sure they'll leave us alone? What if they think we're going to try to – e-expose them or something?" In his nervous state, his tongue started to trip over the words.

Far above him, Einhardt let out a laugh, thin, hollow, and merciless. He laughed for so long that the sound echoed through the undergrowth surrounded them all, until the same sad, lonely sound seemed to come at them from all directions, surrounding their little camp with its sorrow.

The camp fell quiet for a moment, and even Einhardt's laugh died out. Jacobs and Liever, who had been murmuring together, had fallen silent at the first sounds of Einhardt; Liever was now looking at a point beyond his hands that no one else could see, his eyes shining, and Jacobs was focusing on the dark bottom of his bottle with the dull, weary eyes of those men who have seen too much war without being able to go insane. No one spoke for a minute, staring into the heart of the fire or off into the darkness, each brought forcefully back to their painful memories, all but Einhardt, who was in that terrible death-sleep which inhabits the minds of men whose bare functions are carried out as if by some inner mechanism.

The first to break the silence was Gerald. Tossing back his shaggy mane of hair with one headshake, he said, "Son, if we told someone they tried to kill us, what do you think would happen? At best this someone would be sympathetic, but even then what would they do? Lodge a complaint? And anyways, soldiers get executed all the time…"

Liever looked up. "They do? Why?"

"Well, if an officer is negligent, or insubordinate, or something stupid like that," said Gerald, "Sometimes it's one straw too many. You can get away with a lot, if you're a disgruntled senior officer. If you're on a ship in space, there's no one there to stop you." He swallowed. "But Emperor help you if you should have a commissar in your unit… My platoon officer back on the Cadian fields was the weak-willed type, and we performing a squad drill – you know, false combat, static weapons, stuff like that – and our squad came under some light fire. We were in the light grass, so we took a few casualties, but the platoon officer was a green officer and so he ordered us to retreat to the hill.

"It turned out this commissar was watching the whole time. From the sidelines. And he walked out onto the field slowly and calmly. Emperor catch me lying, but not a single lasbolt touched him. He walked silently up to my officer, and shot him in the head. No warning, no hesitation."

His voice trailed off. The others watched him for a moment. Eventually they turned away.

Jacobs swung over his torso and grabbed his lasrifle. "Now this, son, is a lasrifle. It is often the sole weapon of guardsmen, and is probably one of the most common weapons in the entire galaxy. Even the orks get their hands on them sometimes. The lasrifle is not a very strong weapon. It doesn't pack the punch of a bolter or have the… _finesse_ of a sword." He grinned. "Guardsmen aren't delicate enough for that."

"Now the lasrifle might not be very powerful, but what it lacks in strength it makes up for in _reliability_ and _consistency_." With those words, he jammed the rifle into his shoulder, brought it up to face level swiftly and surely, and pulled the trigger firmly three times, scattering a pile of now red-hot pebbles. Liever looked on with an intense look of concentration. Jacobs lowered the rifle a few inches, nodding as he surveyed his shots, then dropped the gun and began to dismantle it, speaking at the same time.

"This," he said, holding up the magazine, "Is an Mk 7 rechargeable power cell, more commonly known as a battery or a magazine. It can be recharged by placing it near heat or in sunlight for an hour or so, which will top up the charge." He leaned over and place it a foot from the smoldering fire. "Throwing it in the fire – as it seems Keller may have attempted to do – is inadvisable, because it can shorten the life of the battery and reduce the charge it holds, but it'll do for emergency. However, subjecting the battery to such treatment repeatedly will, as Keller well knows – " Here he looked over at Keller with a wicked grin which was returned with a lazy wink, " – will render the containment shield a lot more unstable, making it easy to breach it with a normal las shot. So these "ubercharged" batteries, as some refer to them, can be used as grenades in a pinch."

"Damn straight," yawned Kelley, then took a swig of liquid from an amber bottle. "One you gotta shoot at, though. It's why I carry this baby." He patted a holster on his left hip and took another swig.

"Indeed," said Jacobs in amusement. "Anyways, that's the battery pack. This," he said, snapping off the stock, "Is the stock. Put it on, provides a bit of accuracy. Take it off, provides mobility. There's not much to say." He tossed it over to Liever, who examined it for a moment, then put it down carefully next to him. Jacobs flipped the gun so it was pointing straight in the air and ran a finger down the barrel. "This long piece is the barrel, through which the shot fires. This part on the end is the muzzle, so the shot doesn't explode in your face or blind you. Sometimes you get a silencer, which muffles or disguises the sound of the shot, but they're rare for lasguns. Specialised equipment. Some lasguns have a longer barrel, which are used as sniping weapons."

"Like Einhardt has?" said Liever, breaking his silence for the first time.

Jacobs chuckled. "No, Einhardt has a dedicated sniper rifle he swears he "found" in a Space Marine Armoury. It has a much longer stock than anything you'll find on a lasgun, and uses shells of depleted uranium or deuterium, which it fires at a supersonic velocity. Even when he uses more mundane hunting rounds, it's still a much more powerful weapon than a lasgun. It's also got a beastly scope; which, word has it, uses electronic targeting technology, but I've never been able to find out." He spun the weapon around so that Liever could see the top. "If I had a scope, it would go here. See this rail? On there you can slide any piece of extra equipment you like, so long as it's designed to fit on it. You'll usually see two times scopes on the ones used as snipers, but you also get thermal scopes, which read heat signatures, or light sensitive ones, which modify the view to adapt to lighting conditions, like night vision that works in daylight. Most commonly, though, you'll see laser-dot attachments. All Storm troopers have them, and lots of veterans like to carry them, as they improve your aim a bit; I prefer iron sights, though – these pieces of metal here and here." He tapped the gun in the respective places, then flipped it back on its side again and tapped a piece of metal just above the magazine. "This is the eject button. Not to difficult to use. Hit this, the charge slides out. Slam a new battery in, and be on your way, like this." He demonstrated quickly, sliding the magazine in and out. "This little switch here is the safety. Straight up, like it is now, and you fire freely. But twist it towards the left, like so – " The safety clicked. " – and you can't shoot yourself in the foot. Here, have a look. – Careful, now!"

Liever swept the gun out of Jacobs' hands and in one fluid motion tucked it into his armpit, hold it down tightly with his right hand. With his left, he ejected the magazine, reached out with an arm like a snake and grabbed a new charge off Jacob's vest, twisting and pulling to snap it off in one quick move. It slid home with a satisfying _click_, and he brought the weapon up smartly to aim across the fire at the other veterans. "Don't move!"

Webber yelped and spluttered, dropping to the ground. Gerald looked around with a look of mild surprise, and Keller only gave him an acidic look and said, "Don't point that thing at me, idiot. Jacobs, teach your monkey to play nice with his toys."

"Jesus, man, you scared me," said Webber, his head poking up from the dirt. "Go to sleep already."

"Goddamn safety wasn't even off," added Keller in a mutter as he turned around to get into his sleeping bed.

Liever looked at the lasgun and then at the men with a look of mild disappointment. Jacobs laughed. "Don't worry about it. You'll have to get up earlier than that to fool any of us. Even Webber was probably about two seconds away from taking your head off."

Liever laughed reluctantly, then handed the weapon back to Jacobs before dragging up his blanket to cover from the wind that rushed through the bushes. In a few minutes he was asleep.

Pirate Ship _Angelfire_

In Hyperspace Quadrant 2487b (Rynadon System)

7.12.40185

Captain Petreias sat in a stark white chair in his dimly lit quarters, anxiously examining the holo display set up on the table in front of him. The chair he was in was designed to mold itself to your body, but the Captain was hunched forward, his back and legs stiff as ramrods, perched on the edge of the chair. The room itself was tastefully done, with molded edges and arranged furniture. A huge, ancient, wooden four-poster bed dominated one corner of the room, but at the moment all Petreias could focus on was the display in front of his eyes.

To the casual observer, it seemed as if a head was resting on the table – an aged, scarred, careworn face. The head was almost bald, with patchy hair growing sporadically like fungus. The eyebrows seemed to be scorched off completely, and a welt ran from over his left eye to his left ear. His lips were craggy and dry, but the voice that issued forth was clear and unwavering.

"We must act quickly and move decisively if we are to deal with this threat," he said rapidly. "I don't know how this man found out about the Cartaraz artifact, but he is clearly reporting to forces far beyond his reckoning. If he realized a fraction of what we knew…" The aged Inquisitor shook his head. "But he clearly does not. His mind is corrupted, but the stink of Chaos is not with his ship. In any case, my agents will soon deal with him." Bitterness began to pervade his voice. "We've come much too far to be hindered by this foolish child who has no idea of what he is involved in. This… _nuisance_ will be dealt with shortly." His face tightened

Petreias sighed, long and heavily. "I'm afraid you're probably right, as always, my friend. But I'm reluctant to claim more lives over something that has already taken so many."

Torres shrugged, unconcerned by his friend's sentimental nature. "Well, it's his own fault for being lured by Chaos."

"Yes, but still…" Petreias shrugged wearily. "Anyways, I've been running expedited scans on the SYScat network. We've detected significant warp and psychic power in the area. There is a great deal of interference from the Tyranid activity in the sector, but there are definitely significant streams of energy being channeled through the artifact." He looked down at his lap. "It's powering up."

The Inquisitor's tone was sharp. "We don't know that. Remember, the Blackstone needs a conduit, some kind of channel to utilize its energy. If the Gate of Krystal was any indication, a high-level psyker is needed to mould the warp in the way the Blackstone was intended for. Even an Alpha-level psyker wasn't enough to do what the artifacts were really designed for – as you should well remember. All he did was to collapse the hole in warp space that was the Gate, and that destroyed his body as well as his mind."

Both men shuddered. The memory of that terrible night passed like a dark cloud across their minds. After a short pause, Torres continued.

"So, if it was active again, there would need to be a conduit; a psyker, or even some device that we are unaware of. It could just be stray psychic energy, a bulge in warp space, or even – if we're unlucky – some demon that managed to force its way onto the physical plane."

Petreias frowned. "I'd like to say you're right, but I have to disagree. The power levels we're getting are enormous, almost off the scale –and that's just preliminary analysis. This is more than just a spike, or even a few warp-spawned miscreants. No, this is raw warp energy. In fact, if it weren't all nice and nestled up inside the Blackstone, we'd be sitting right in the middle of a level seven warp storm right now."

Torres laughed. "You're not making much sense, my old friend. Where could all that power go?"

Petreias spoke hesitantly. "There is one possibility that I thought of. There is a force on this world we haven't reckoned on."

The Inquisitor was not slow on the uptake. "The Tyranids. Time and time again I have wondered what they are doing on this planet. But we must hope that they chanced upon it by accident."

Petreias now spoke in a hushed tone, almost a whisper. "They _are_ masters of psychic power, you don't suppose they somehow figured out how to – ?"

His friend cut him off forcibly. "That is not a line of thought I would pursue." His face sagged. "If that were to happen… the entire human race…"

The line went dead, and the display went black. The captain fell back in his chair, his mind racing. Within minutes, he was fast asleep.

Forward Base of the 57th Regiment

Planet Rynadon

7.12.40185

Commander Perrell had set up a temporary office in one of the abandoned houses near the middle of the ghost town. It was small, with only a single room on the ground floor, but there was a large desk placed squarely in the middle of the room that suited the commander perfectly. The room had once been a homely kitchen, but now everything had been tossed out into a side alley to make room for equipment. Ammo crates were stacked next to the wall, boxes full of ancient maps littered the floor around the desk, python-like cable and bundles of red and black snaked across the floor, and a giant holo projector dominated one wall of the room. The door was open, and through it came the busy but orderly clamour of the 57th establishing camp and setting up gear. The wind was up, and a breeze curled through the door and raised a tiny tornado of dust to whirl around Perrell's boots.

The commander himself was seated in a giant, hardbacked chair, peering through a spectacle at a map of the main continent of Rynadon that had been unfurled on the desk. The spectacle was a relic, an ancient artifact by modern technology's standards, but Perrell preferred it for examining the finer details of things. At the moment, it was being held barely an inch above the map, a thin circle of glass suspended between the map and Perrell's good eye. With it, he was studying an intricately drawn coastline on the northwest corner of the continent. Next to the map laid an envelope with an unrecognizable seal on it. Above it sat a letter that was folded into three portions, the upper of which was visible. It read:

_Commander,_

_Despite your evident failure, or that of your subordinates, I have concluded that we must proceed regardless with our original intended plan. Committing your forces outright will be risky and could lead to suspicion amongst higher ranks, but it is a risk we must be willing to take if we are to_

Up the steps leading towards the door, footsteps sounded. First Lieutenant Abulard strode through the door, looking crisp and neat in his military outfit. His boots rapped the floor smartly as he stamped in and saluted. "Reporting as ordered, commander."

Perrell didn't even look up. "Drop the formalities, lieutenant, and come over here. I've got something to show you."

Abulard walked around the desk and bent over slightly to look at the map. "Sir?"

Perrell ran a slim finger over the coastline absentmindedly. "There is a target on this planet of high military importance to my… superiors. My orders are to take it at all costs, and so _your_ orders will be similar." As he spoke, he pulled out a slightly smaller map from underneath the larger one and flattened it out. Abulard scanned it quickly. We're after a small articraft of some kind, although the details don't concern you and I'd prefer if you didn't think about it. But even though it's small, it's still important. We need to commit all of our forces on this one – I don't want to risk losing this objective. We need to cordon off this area here." He tapped the map. "Myself, my personal staff and the third platoon of Delta company – our Special Ops men – will enter the zone and take care of our objective. We should take about two hours, tops. Once we accomplish our objective, I want evac shuttles to the capital ship. We're getting off this rock and leaving it to burn." He paused. "Any questions?"

Abulard's head was reeling with questions, but he bit his toungue, knowing it wouldn't do any good. "No sir,"

"Good," said Perrell. "Now go and prepare the troops. I want to mobilize in eight hours." He bent back over the map. After a slight pause, Abulard left the room, understanding himself to be dismissed.

As he walked out onto the dusty roads, his heavy boots thudded hard against the ground. Turning right, he began to head in the direction of the general's camp. In front of him, soldiers raced back and forth across the road, each on their own errands.

Wrong. Abulard frowned.

The soldiers had a frantic, almost aimless air about them. They were yelling back and forth, and the military precision that ordinarily dominated the camp was quickly dissolving. Off in the distance, he could hear shouting. He quickened his pace.

Suddenly, an explosion hit far off, near the horizon. Tens of square kilometers of the planet were instantly incinerated. A flash of blinding white light blew out from the point of impact; trees were blown apart, and branches were carried on the shockwave as it expanded outwards.

Abulard cursed and dived into the doorway of a nearby building, rolling into a ball. Several soldiers yelled, a weapon went off, and there was an instant of silence.

Then the shockwave smashed into the houses.

The small houses, never built to withstand two consecutive shocks, trembled and then ripped apart. Debris flew like shrapnel, burying itself in the ground, the cloth of the makeshift tents, and the flesh of several soldiers. One man was killed as a roof shingle sliced through his forehead, ripping his head open and spewing blood everywhere. Another was blown by the shock straight onto a tilted gatepost. A third lost his head when his flying body didn't clear the doorway completely.

Abulard felt his body get thrown back, and an instant later his back hit a wall. His arms flew back and he screamed as something painful snapped, but his hands protected his head. Then the shockwave passed through him, leaving a painful ringing in his ears.

Then something hit his face and he blacked out.


End file.
